


Carry On, Simon Snow.

by tyrannusbasilton



Category: Carry On - Rainbow Rowell, ROWELL Rainbow - Works
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-16
Updated: 2016-05-11
Packaged: 2018-05-14 09:19:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 33,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5738107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tyrannusbasilton/pseuds/tyrannusbasilton
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set a few years after Carry On. Simon finds out who his parents are and realizes he may not be as Normal as he thought he was.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Agatha Returns

**Author's Note:**

> For Roos, because she doesn't want to read anyone's crap, except mine.

BAZ

It’s three in the afternoon when I walk out of class and check my phone. I haven’t seen Simon in a while - I was busy studying for my exams and decided that being around him was too distracting. (His hair is too beautifully curly, his eyes are too stunningly blue, his tail is constantly flapping around, it was driving me insane.) A few days ago, we agreed that we’d meet up for coffee today, but we didn’t set a time and he hasn’t responded to any of my texts asking him when he wanted to meet.  
As horribly desperate as it is to admit, not seeing him, even if only for a week at most, was agonising. At Watford, when we still hated each other (or at least pretended to), we always saw one another in our room, during class, at dinner, during a fight, hiding from a chimera; we never spent a second away from each other. Nowadays, we see each other at least every day. We don’t necessarily do anything: he’ll just lie on the couch, eating whatever butter-smeared food he’s craving at the moment, either with his headphones in or studying, and I’ll sit in their armchair or at their kitchen counter, studying too. After all, I’m a Pitch, and we’re nothing if not diligent. But lately we’ve been a bit more scattered. We can’t always make time to see each other, and as much as I hate my own apartment (or should I say Fiona’s) — because I’m alone there, and Snow’s halfway across London — I can’t always be haunting Snow and Bunce’s doorstep, even though I warned them I would. I wish I could see him more often, but for now, it makes seeing him a little more special. 

I’m lost in my thoughts, waiting for a traffic light to jump to green, thinking about Snow (his moles, tawny skin; his sleepy eyes when I slip out of bed in the morning — I always wake up before him — and the way he smiles into his pillow when I grab one of his shirts and pull it on) when someone hesitantly taps me on my shoulder. I jump and quickly turn around scanning the stranger’s face when I realise it isn’t a stranger.  
It’s Niall.  
I haven’t seen Niall since… I can’t remember. I believe it was a couple of months ago at a Christmas mixer at the club. My father and Daphne made me go — I haven’t gone to the club regularly since I was kidnapped there. Niall and I greeted each other then, talked about the weather, and went our separate ways.  
It’s been over two years since we’ve actually been friends. Over two years since I went back to Watford to finish my year without Simon, and Dev and Niall were the only people I could sit with in the dining hall.  
They’re moderately good company. On some days. However, they knew about me and Simon. And they still hated Simon the way we had all the years before. It was never the same for them, and I can’t say it was the same for me either. We barely spoke at our graduation, and that’s that.  
But here he is, standing in front of me, two years later. I can’t say I expected that.  
Though I suppose London isn’t that big, and I knew Niall and I would be studying at the same university. Taken aback, I’m not quite sure what to say, so for a few good seconds we just stare at each other, waiting for the other to speak up.  
I change my mind. London is that big, and this is just my terrible, terrible luck.  
‘’Basil?’’, he says. He poses it as a question, which confuses me because if he already recognised me, and tapped me on the shoulder, surely he couldn’t still be unsure whether it was actually me.  
‘’Yes, obviously.’’ I realise as I’m saying it that things have changed, and I can’t be quite as rude and direct to him as I would have been, back when he was still my ‘minion’. (Crowley, I miss having minions. Made life so much easier at times.) ‘’Niall, good to see you’’, I say trying to make a smooth recovery, ‘’How have you been?’’  
‘’I’ve been good. I’m engaged actually.’’ His face doesn’t move, not even a little bit, as he says it.  
I remember how being with him and Dev felt so suffocating at times. It’s amazing that in the past two years he’s found a girl and settled down, but you couldn’t tell that from looking at him. His face is stiff, and cold. The way Simon describes my face looks like when he claims I’m ‘doing it again’.  
Being with Simon Snow not only means constant happiness, but Simon makes me feel…well, aloof. Years and years of training to mirror my father, never letting a single smile flash through, are wearing down. Just a little bit. I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint Snow with the fact that my mask is never really going to fade away: it’s just a way of life.  
Niall however still shows the same composure he did at Watford, and I quickly move past his lack of emotion to congratulate him. Engaged, just two years after Watford. I suppose for Normals that’s considered early, but if I hadn’t been in love with Simon Snow, my father wouldn’t have expected any different from me either. If I had been ‘normal’, I’d have met a nice girl, from a prominent family, finished Watford, and married her straight away. Alas, I’m not normal and I keep finding new ways to disappoint my father.  
Niall and I exchange pleasantries, talk about university life and the weather, and not once does he acknowledge Simon’s existence, or ask any questions about my romantic life. He does point out that the Families are doing well, and are eager to see me again. Just me.  
’’We’ve missed you at the club, Baz. You should come around sometime. Meet some new people.’’, he said, actually sneering. I taught him that move. It makes me sick to have it used against me.  
Poor Snow had to deal with my sneering for seven years. I’m almost positively sure what Niall was trying to say was: You can still change your mind. And even if you don’t: we’d honestly rather see you be an eternal bachelor than have you bring your gay, non-magickal boyfriend to the club.  
I consider arguing him. I consider getting angry with him and hitting him back with that same sneer and some witty retaliation—but surely he knows that I’m uninterested to meet new people and, so it would be futile to make a fuss about it.  
I simply don’t care: about him, or the club. I haven’t been there in a while, and it’s been the most liberating while of my life. After his remark, I quickly make up an excuse to leave, shake his hand and walk away. Even I’m not polite enough to ignore that comment.

I continue making my way through the London crowd.  
I wonder if everything has been worth it. If all of this has been worth giving up my family and status for.  
I haven’t been to the club in months, haven’t seen any of the Old Families apart from that one time at the Christmas mixer, and that was about the same time I last saw my Father and Daphne.  
They call me occasionally. Daphne asks me what I’m eating — actual food, not, you know, blood —, and my father asks me about my studies, or any potential financial issues. Neither of us bring up Simon, or my being a vampire. I don’t exactly crave more quality father-son time, but completely cutting ties with your old way of life; it’s been tough.  
I never tell Simon any of this. I know it would make him doubt himself, make him feel guilty for not being as posh as my father had wanted for me, or as female. However the truth is, even if Simon wouldn’t believe me, I’d do it all over again. I’d do it a million times if it meant lazy Sundays watching Doctor Who with Simon, eating sour cherry scones for breakfast, lunch and dinner, getting sleepy kisses in the middle of the night if one of us gets up to use the bathroom. I’d trade everything I’ve ever had to be with Simon, because he’s the only thing I’ve ever had that’s actually meant something to me. A home. And in some ways, freedom. I used to think Watford was my home, but perhaps Simon is what made it feel so homely. Especially now that I can be myself, completely. Without having to hide behind layers of sneers and sarcasm.

It is with this positive thought that I walk into Starbucks — Snow loves it there, he has been trying to persuade me to work here for months — when I see bronze curls sitting at a table, sipping a cup of coffee, across from him a blonde, brown eyed girl in a jean jacket. I stop in the entrance to look at her. Her skin is tan, almost sparkly, and her eyes are big and shimmering. She’s sitting with her legs crossed, one hand holding a cup of coffee to her lips, the other nervously picking at her jacket collar. Agatha.  
I’ve never particularly understood the attraction to Wellbelove — mainly due to my being queer — however, objectively, I have to admit, she’s a beautiful girl.  
My stomach turns and I feel waves of anger rolling up inside of me, shooting up my cheeks. She’s beautiful. She’s here. Why is she here? What did Bunce say about her again? California was it? Why is Simon at Starbucks, already drinking coffee without me, making googly eyes at Agatha? Why couldn’t he have just answered my texts if his phone is resting on the table right next to him?  
That is my first thought: jealousy. After stopping to think about it for a second, a new wave of dread drowns me as I realise how incredibly uncomfortable this next encounter is going to be.  
Simon Snow—an unbearably annoying man who to this day still has not sorted out his whole sexuality-debacle —— Agatha, his ex-girlfriend, who ran away to America, leaving him to die, and me, the boy she had crush on, now dating Simon, which she probably knows nothing about. Unless he told her. Crowley, I hope he told her. A downright mess this is. 

Simon says something and Agatha giggles a charming laugh, throwing her head back.  
I could leave. I could turn around, close the door behind me and perhaps stake out in Simon’s flat until he comes back. I consider this for some time, however, I’m a tall, dark haired, handsome vampire standing in the doorway, intensely staring at two people sitting at a table, so I seem to have drawn some attention to myself and soon enough Agatha turns to see what everyone is looking at, when she recognises me.  
‘’Baz.’’, she utters. She looks astounded to see me, so my hopes of Simon having told her about me fade away.  
‘’What?’’, Simon asks, looking up at her questioningly, then he turns his head to see what’s she staring at and he sees me. Normally our faces soften when we see each other, especially after not seeing one another for a long time; now our faces are a mixture of both confusion and dread. I can practically see the wheels turning in his stupid head and I resist the urge to roll my eyes.  
If I thought running into Niall was horrifying and awkward, this takes horrifying to an entirely different level. I’m not one to be at a loss of words, but I find myself staring expectantly at Simon to explain either to Agatha what I’m doing here, or to me what she’s doing here.  
‘’Wellbelove.’’, I say. Of course I think the whole last name thing has gotten old, but I’ve been doing it for so long, it comes naturally to me. I even call Simon, Snow sometimes. A lot of times, actually. He hates it. I love it.  
I make my way past the tables towards them and Simon jumps off his chair, his eyes wide, his hands nervously smoothing down his jeans.  
‘’Baz, what on earth are you doing here?’’, Agatha asks, looking up at me.  
‘’Can we talk real quick?’’, Simon inserts and he grabs my arm and drags me outside. We’re standing right in front of the large window panes of the store. Simon is wearing one of my jumpers — he usually does this when we haven’t seen each other in a while, he says it smells like me, like cedar and bergamot, and that ‘soothes him’ — and a pair of dark jeans. Bunce must have spelled his wings tucked in tightly, because he looks nothing out of the ordinary.  
‘’Snow, what are you doing?’’, I snap.  
‘’Look, I really didn’t plan it this way—‘’  
‘’Well that’s a comforting thought, because this would probably be the worst devised plan ever.’’  
‘’Look, Baz I just came here, and well, actually, I realised this morning that we hadn’t set a time, and since I didn’t have anything else to do, I figured I’d just come here and study and wait for you to show up but then Agatha called me and told me she flew in from America a few days ago, and she was wondering whether I had anything to do, and I was so surprised to hear from her I told her I was here, so she told me she’d be there in a few minutes, and here we are.’’  
I sneer: ’’You’re rambling.’’  
I can see he’s taken aback by my sneering: we haven’t been this cold or ‘sneery’ to each other in a long time. It reminds him of before. Then his face changes and I can see his mood go from disgruntled to amused.  
‘’Baz, are you jealous?’’, he asks, and I can see his face break into a grin.  
‘’I am not, Snow.’’, I say sternly as I glance worriedly inside the store. ‘’Is Agatha watching us?’’  
‘’Yes you are. You’re sneering and calling me ‘Snow’. That leads me to think you are either plotting to kill me, or very, very jealous.’’  
‘’Or perhaps I’m mortified at the sight of this extremely uncomfortable encounter.’’  
‘’You’re jealous.’’, Simon says, grinning again.  
‘’Snow, what have you told her? What do we do? Do we try to explain?’’  
‘’Of course we try to explain.’’  
‘’Well I wouldn’t be so sure if I were you.’’, I say, glancing inside the store once more. ‘’I could just leave, we could say it was a coincidence and that I had to go.’’  
‘’If anything that’d just be more suspicious.’’, Simon says now, and he grabs my hands giving me a reassuring look. His hands are cold. It’s sunny outside, but he isn’t wearing a coat and he’s slightly shivering. I’d pull him close and kiss his face to warm him up, if I wasn’t incredibly anxious at the thought of having Agatha witness that.  
‘’Baz, Agatha’s going to be here for a while. I want her to know the truth. I don’t want to hide you from her. I don’t want to hide you from anyone.’’, he says, pulling me a bit closer.  
I can’t help but smirk down at him. I can’t help but smirk down at him whenever he does anything, ever. He’s a beautiful sight to behold, and my stomach still somersaults whenever I look at him.  
I clear my throat and make up my mind.  
‘’This is the most ridiculous thing I have ever done.’’, I say and I hope my nervousness isn’t too blatantly obvious.  
‘’Baz, you’ve actually sucked blood, underground, in the catacombs confirming pretty much every cliché vampire stereotype.’’  
‘’Can you imagine?’’, I reply staring at the ground sheepishly.  
He chuckles then, and I decide to push my worries aside.  
‘’Fine. If this is truly what you want, let’s get it over with.’’  
‘’Alright,’’, he says, sounding surprised, ‘’let’s do it.’’  
I quickly straighten my tie and fold my collar — I’m wearing my navy trench coat —, and follow Simon back into the store. As I expected, Wellbelove is curiously trying to catch a glimpse of us outside, but as we walk back in she quickly averts her eyes, sits up straight and smoothens her hair.  
‘’Simon, what’s going on?’’, Agatha asks. Simon takes my hand and pushes me into a chair, then flops down across from Agatha himself. She narrows her eyes. ‘’Are you two…friends now?’’, she says hesitantly, and the whole situation has gotten me so uncomfortable I can’t bring myself to stop staring at Simon’s coffee cup. Simon opens his mouth to say something, then stops again. ‘’Well, Agatha’’, he starts. Then he nervously starts pulling at his (my) sweater, and stops talking again. ‘’You see, last Christmas’’, he says, looking fiercely into Agatha’s eyes, then he stops again. He averts his eyes, then decides to speak up again. ‘’I mean — well, you see… What I’m trying to say…’’ I shoot a glance at him and we lock eyes, then I revert my attention to his coffee cup, and he starts intently studying his fingernails.  
He starts stammering again, and I can’t help but shake my head slightly.  
‘’As I was saying, last Christmas. You see, Baz and I, you know. It’s a whole thing…’’ He quickly glances at me, then faces Agatha and blurts out: ‘’We’re dating actually’’  
The longest and most uncomfortable silence follows, which Agatha abruptly breaks by uttering: ‘’Are you taking the piss?’’, narrowing her eyes at Simon.  
Simon hesitates, and I think he might be considering backing out and telling her he was joking, that she ‘should have seen her face just now’, but he interrupts my train of thought by blatantly declaring: ‘’No, I’m not taking the piss. We’re together now.’’  
Agatha turns her head to me and stammers, in sheer disbelief: ‘’Wh-what, you’re gay?’’  
They both look at me expectingly, which makes sense since she just now specifically asked me a question, but for the first time in my life I can’t for the life of me figure out what to answer. My loss at words seems to surprise Agatha, and worry Simon because he chimes in:  
‘’Yes, he is. I mean, I’m pretty sure he is, otherwise this last year would have been difficult to explain.’’  
‘’Yes’’, I manage to spit out. It’s pathetic, really.  
‘’What, and you’re gay?’’, she asks, turning back to Simon now, and he clumsily nods his head yes.  
Agatha leans back in her chair, grasping her cup of coffee, seemingly finding the fact that, that same cup she was sipping just ten minutes ago hasn’t suddenly changed identities, reassuring in some way.  
‘’Well I’m not gay perse.’’ Simon corrects himself, and this doesn’t fail to annoy me endlessly, even though I expected it was bound to come up at some point, but I imagined us having this conversation earlier and without Agatha.  
‘’Then what are you, perse?’’, she persists. ‘’Everything we had… Did you not know? Did it mean anything to you?’’  
‘’Of course it did. You still do, Agatha. Like I said, I don’t really know what I am, but I do know that whatever we had, however much I may have cherished it, simply didn’t work. You know that as well as I do, maybe even better.’’  
She nods her head in confused agreement, and I must admit it reassures me in some strange way that I get to witness this evaluation of their relationship, as if I actually needed to hear once more that whatever Snow had with Agatha, which tortured me for years at end, was just a facade. It didn’t mean anything, surely not as much as what Snow and I have now.

For a while, nobody says anything. Agatha gazes either at me or at Simon, almost in shock, Simon looks about as uncomfortable as I’ve ever seen him, but I’ve somehow managed to distance myself from the sheer awkwardness of the situation, smirking down at my lap, occasionally looking up at the two of them.  
‘’How in Crowley’s name did this happen? You hate each other. Just a few years ago you could have killed each other.’’, Agatha finally says, shaking her head in disbelief.  
‘’I would never have hurt him. I loved him for a long time. If I ever did mange to finish him off, it would merely have been to end my agony.’’, I manage to contribute at last, and even though I’m closely watching Agatha’s reaction, I can see Simon’s face in the corner of my eye slightly soften when I use the word love.  
‘’You’re taking the piss.’’, she says again.  
Simon opens his mouth to say something, then closes it again, and I figure that’s probably better since she might need a few seconds to catch her breath.  
‘’You. And Baz?’’, she repeats, shifting her eyes from me, to Snow, and back to me, ‘’When did this happen?’’  
‘’Around Christmas, I think two years ago.’’, Simon says under his breath.  
‘’Christmas? Wait, you mean that when Penny and I visited you in Hampshire, it had already happened? No, hold up, is that why you practically jumped out of the car? Because you decided that instead of celebrating Christmas like a normal person, you had to go snog your vampire enemy boyfriend to ensure your life’s end?’’, she cried.  
I chip in: ’’Crowley’s sake, Wellbelove, keep your voice down. Like I said, I would never have hurt him.’’  
‘’You’re a vampire.’’, she said to me reproachfully.  
‘’I’m well aware.’’, I reply in a low voice, looking around us cautiously.  
‘’This is completely ridiculous.’’, she asserts, complying to my exact same thought.  
I suppose being who I am, I should have prepared myself for eventually having to face some fellow students, even Agatha, and explaining myself and what had happened between Simon and I.  
But living in this content, happy little world Simon and I had created for ourselves, proved to be comfortable, and private. Dragging Agatha into it all, even if just in my own mind’s eye, would feel like spoiling it.  
‘’You don’t know whether you’re gay.’’, she says to Simon, not even bothering to pose it as a question. ‘’And you are completely sure you are?’’, she says to me, this time expecting an answer.  
‘’Queer as a nine bob note.’’, I say, and I’m not sure how or why I came up with such a strange, inappropriate reply at a time like this.  
‘’Your endless wit’’ Daphne used to say to me, ‘’is going to come back to bite you in the arse some day, Basilton.’’ Daphne almost never swore. I must have really tired her out with my witty comebacks to drive her to something as common as that.  
‘’I’m really not sure what to think of this’’, Agatha finally says and it looks like she’s had about enough, because she’s starting to scramble for her bag.  
‘’I have to go. I just—‘’, and she gets up and makes for the door.  
And that’s about as good as that could have gone.  
I imagined, when I walked back into the store with Simon to tell her, the worst case scenario: we all die because of some mysterious coincidental fire. And the best case scenario which, being the pessimist I am, could not even in my wildest dreams have been her saying: ‘’Alright, that’s totally normal and not at all strange. I suppose I should have figured, the two of you were so obsessed with each other, something was bound to happen. In fact I’m not jealous, I don’t even have any feelings about this at all.’’  
Instead, Simon and I are left at our table, him looking a bit dazed, and me, grinning, because for some reason having my expectations of this situation come true, satisfies me.  
‘’She just left.’’, Simon says, still dazed.  
‘’She has a tendency to do that, doesn’t she.’’  
‘’Oh stop it.’’, he says shoving me teasingly. He looks disappointed, and still incredibly dazed, so I grab his hand and rub my thumb over the back of it. He looks up at me and smiles weakly.  
‘’She’ll come around, love, don’t worry.’’, I soothe him.  
However, I’m not so sure. No one’s heard of Agatha this past year, so she must have liked the solitude in America. Coming back to find everything’s still as everlastingly changing and, well, fucked up, must drive her right back into America’s big arms.  
On the other hand, she did apparently find a reason to come back. Perhaps she did miss Simon, and Bunce even, which leads me to think there is a chance we’ll hear from her again, though probably not anytime soon.  
Simon puts his other hand on top of mine and gives it a squeeze. ‘’I’ve missed you.’’  
‘’I’ve missed you too, Snow.’’  
He cocks his head and looks up at me expectantly, so I correct myself: ‘’I’ve missed you too, Simon.’’  
He closes his eyes and nods approvingly, and I get up, dragging him with me by the hand. He flashes me a smile, and then says hesitantly:  
‘’You suppose Penny’s talked to Agatha yet?’’

She did. ‘’Crowley, you two really did botch that up splendidly, didn’t you?’’, she says now, as we walk into their flat. Simon flops his bag and coat on the floor next to the door, and I patiently take my trench coat off, pick Simon’s coat up from the floor and hang them both on the coat rack on the wall. I take my bag, remove my laptop and carefully place it on the dining table.  
Simon looks pained. ‘’You heard then, didn’t you?’’  
She’s smirking and nodding her head yes, but when she looks at Simon’s twisted face she hurriedly says: ‘’Oh, come off it, Simon, it had to happen someday.’’  
‘’Not like this.’’, he answers her, his face in anguish.  
‘’It was a travesty.’’, I add coolly, and Bunce looks at me like I’m no help. I’m not. But I can tell she’s half enjoying this, and to be honest so am I. It’s been a few hours, and I’ve managed to distance myself from the conversation, now able to find some humour in it all. It was indeed one of the most ridiculous things I’ve ever had happen to me. Simon however still feels embarrassed and he plops down on the couch next to her.  
‘’I asked her if she wanted to meet up some time this week.’’, she says.  
Simon looks up at her expectantly. ‘’Will you just explain everything to her some more? I’d do it myself, but she left so abruptly and I don’t think she wants to see me anytime soon.’’  
‘’Oh, she’ll be fine.’’, Penelope replies.  
‘’Just please, explain it to her a bit, maybe smooth things over? She must think I’m insane. And she definitely still thinks Baz is evil.’’  
‘’We’re still not sure he isn’t.’’, she says with a smirk, looking up at me hoping to get a reaction.  
I sneer at her, and take a seat in front of my laptop, opening it up.  
‘’Simon, it’ll be all right. She just needs some time to process it, and when I see her I’m sure she’ll be a bit more comfortable with the situation, and you’ll be back sipping coffee together in no time.’’  
I can’t help but feel a shot of jealousy when she says it, but I decide to just push it back down and let it go: I must be an imbecile if I still think there’s any chance that Simon and Agatha are going to get back together. He told her so himself.  
Penelope grabs Simon’s hand, gives it a tight squeeze, then brings her attention back to the book on her lap. After staring absentmindedly at the screen for a while, Simon reaches for the remote, turns the tv on, and calls me over. I look up, and he motions for me to come over, so I grab my laptop and saunter over, give him a quick peck on the lips, cupping his cheek with my hand, and take a seat in front of him on the floor, leaning against the couch. His tail flops around excitedly again, which tells me he’s happy to be me near me.  
It doesn’t bother me this time, because he’s happy, and I’m happy, and that’s all I need for now. I relax into the couch, typing away on my computer and Simon runs his hands through my hair, watching some game show on the telly. I’m back home again.


	2. Glowing Little Bubble

SIMON

I’m not sure how I felt about seeing Agatha. I suppose I should be angry with her. Baz sure was, though I’m not sure whether he was angry because he still blames her for running away that day after Christmas, or if he was just jealous. I’d like to believe he was jealous. Not just because the thought of Baz being jealous of Agatha kind of endears me — I mean honestly, it’s ridiculous, he has nothing to worry about —, but also because I don’t want Baz to blame Agatha for running away. I don’t. I’ve always been a safety hazard, from day one. I attracted danger to Watford every single day, and it was me — or I suppose my evil, eleven year-old twin — almost destroying the entire world of Mages. I don’t blame Agatha for trying to get as far away from me as possible, I probably would have done the same. I still don’t understand why Baz and Penelope aren’t doing so right now. 

There are a still some things about Baz that I don’t completely understand.  
Ever since our first kiss, things have definitely been different, very different, from how they were before, but Baz isn’t necessarily different. I mean, of course the way he behaves around me is different — all the hostility there used to be between us is gone —, but he’s still pretty closed off. He no longer hides behind his whole wall of pessimism and general dick-ish behaviour, but he still hides behind a mask sometimes. If something is bothering him — and quite naturally, every now and then something does — he can get cold and distant. He never tells me upfront what’s bothering him, I have to push him to finally tell me what happened or where his head’s at. He doesn’t like to show his weaknesses in front of me, though I’ve told him repeatedly there’s nothing he could do to make me think less of him.  
I don’t mind though, cracking the big mystery that is Baz. I’ve always liked to step up to a challenge, and Baz, by his very nature, is one.  
Not just him, but our relationship, his family, his being a vampire and naturally, his magic.  
I still feel horrible whenever magic happens to come up in conversation with Baz. Not just because I miss it so much it hurts, but because his family probably hates me for pretty much destroying their home, and I don’t really understand why Baz doesn’t. His family, magic, it’s all strung together in a web of complications. I know he actively tries to avoid the subject, but magic is part of him. It’s in his blood and history, and though he tries to avoid using it or even talking about it, I can feel his magic when I’m around him.  
Penny isn’t entirely sure why I can still feel magic around magicians, sometimes even see it, like a glowing little bubble surrounding them, keeping them safe. I can see Baz’ fire in his eyes, I can feel Penny’s magic, vibrant under her skin. The fact that Penny isn’t sure how it’s possible worries me — and frustrates her to no end —, but then again I also have wings and a tail, and she can’t explain that either. I thought when I lost my magic, I’d lost what made me special, but now, even in de magickal world, I’m an enigma. I suppose I always have been; being The Chosen One and everything. 

Sometimes I can just feel Baz feeling sorry for me when he thinks I’m not paying attention. He’ll shoot me this look, full of sorrow. When Penny casually reheats her cup of tea by using ‘’Some like it hot!’’ because she was too busy reading something to finish it, or when we’re talking about our old Watford days and I mention casting ‘’Out, out damned spot!’’ during class, or when Baz or Penny tell any kind of story involving any kind of magic. He’ll tense up and look over at me, semi-casually, but it’s the pity in his eyes that gets me worked up, not my feeling of nostalgia when talking about magic.  
Sometimes, when I’m lying in bed alone, I let my mind slip to the old days. I try to imagine what it felt like when I still had my magic. Back then, I had to dig deep down inside of me to let my magic float up to the surface. I remember how easy it had been to use Baz as a wand when we fought —or should I say soothed — the dragon. Using my magic as a tap, just opening up inside and feeling it spark through my veins. Sometimes I swear I feel it again. But not like before. Not like an uncontrolled explosion, like I’m a bomb waiting to go off, but like a controlled, weak spark, welling up in my stomach. It doesn’t feel like a well, like Penelope described it, or like flexing a muscle or lighting a match, it feels like heat radiating from deep inside of me, like brushing past the sun.  
But it can’t be real.  
My magic is gone, and I know that. Whatever sparks I may feel, they’re just a poor imitation of what I once was, and I don’t indulge myself. I never let myself think about magic for too long, just like I never used to let myself think about Watford during the summer. Thinking about magic is like scratching an open wound over and over again, so it never heals. It leads nowhere, so I distract myself with uni, and vampires and scones. 

All in all, seeing Agatha felt good. Besides my confusion whether I should resent her or not — I decided I couldn’t even if I wanted to —, I mostly missed her. We were friends once. I’m not sure how we could have lasted all those years together if we didn’t at least half enjoy each others company. She was kind to me, and I do believe she genuinely cared for me, maybe she still does now.  
Comparing our relationship to my relationship with Baz is nearly impossible. They feel like two completely different things. With Agatha, it often felt like we were just going through the motions, like we were supposed to. I had a girlfriend, because I was supposed to. She was beautiful, and lovely, and kind, and I was the Chosen One, the Mage’s Heir, the one to save us all. We were supposed to be together. And that was our sole reason to stay together. We kissed, we held hands. I was usually the one to initiate romantic gestures. She always reciprocated, but in retrospect I don’t think she really enjoyed it. She can’t have disliked it either, because she would have ended it earlier if that were true, but she must just not have felt anything. For me, it was all brand new, and I was really curious about relationships, and girls, and love in general. Looking back now, curiosity can’t replace that spark. There it is again, that word. Spark. That spark you feel when you’re in love. Newly in love or happily married, that special spark you feel when you see the one you love. When your heart skips a beat when they walk into the room, and all you can see is their face, and you light up and your face softens and you don’t even notice it’s happening. That spark.  
Agatha and I never had that spark. 

But we did have a lot of other things. We had a lot of Christmases together, and long nights looking at the stars talking about everything, and nothing, at the same time. I told her about the Mage, and my relationship with him, and she was the only one in my life who wouldn’t look at me with a look of judgement. Whenever I discussed the Mage with Penny, she’d nearly shudder and I could practically see her writing an angry manifesto in her head about all his wrongdoings. Sure, she was nothing compared to her mother, who probably actually did write a few manifestos, but my point is, it wasn’t what I wanted, or needed, to hear at times like that. Agatha didn’t judge. She just listened. And sometimes when I was upset, she felt my magic overflow and spark around us, and she’d grab my hand and we’d just look at the stars silently. I don’t know what Agatha thought at those times, whether she thought about the imminent danger I brought with me, but whatever she might have been thinking, for me, being with her felt safe, because she didn’t ask me what my next course of action was, or how I was going to beat the Humdrum. Unlike the Mage, or Penny for that matter, she didn’t expect anything from me. And I appreciated that.

Then, when things started happening between her and Baz — or as I later found out, started not-happening —, all I could feel around her was angst and anger, because things weren’t working out like they were supposed to. Our entire relationship, all we worried about was how things were supposed to be, and ironically, it ended up ruining it. There are other reasons of course. Quite frankly I don’t think Agatha and I were very much attracted to each other. I was, in some extent, but the attraction pretty much faded away when our relationship started feeling like an uphill battle. Funny how emotion can play such a huge part in attraction.

She’s changed now. She told me about America, that she’s going to a Normal university in America — which is pretty regular, just like in the UK, there are no Magick schools in America, apart from a few very small ones across the country which are rumoured to be cult-related —, and that she shares a room with a Normal girl, who’s teaching her to play the ukulele.  
Magic isn’t that big a part of her life anymore, she told me, and she’s happy that way. She even left her wand in the UK.  
I’m glad she’s found a way to be more comfortable with herself and her magic in America. I suppose being at Watford suffocated her the same way Baz describes the way his family makes him feel sometimes. I guess my relationship with her suffocated her in some ways too.  
I didn’t want to tell her I’d lost my magic because I felt like that would probably ruin the moment a bit.

Before Baz walked in and everything kind of went south, somehow we had gotten to talk about relationships and romance.  
At one point I just blatantly asked her: ‘’So, are you seeing anyone?’’  
Curiosity got the best of me. I think part of me wanted to hear she was seeing someone so I could tell her about Baz, without worrying that she wasn’t over it yet. Over me. Or over him, I guess.  
(Who am I supposed to be jealous of in this situation?)  
I couldn’t think about anything other than how to tell her about Baz, the moment she walked in.  
I was so busy thinking about how to tell her about Baz, I actually forgot about the fact that he could barge in at any minute, because we agreed to meet up.  
That’s why when he finally did barge in, it scared the living hell out of me.  
Agatha gave me an awkward look.  
‘’Simon’’  
‘’Agatha’’  
‘’Do you really want to talk about this?’’  
I couldn’t help but giggle.  
‘’It’s been two years, you don’t reckon we ought to be over it by now?’’  
She laughed too, and for a second it felt like old times again, laughing together like we used to at Watford.  
‘’Fine, then. No, I’m not seeing anyone. I haven’t since…well, I just haven’t felt that way about anyone in a long time.’’  
I don’t even think she meant me when she said that. She probably meant Baz, which made my stomach turn.  
‘’You mean you haven’t had a crush on anyone since we broke up?’’  
Agatha didn’t like to talk about this, I could tell. First, she didn’t say anything, but I kept looking at her expectantly until finally she sighed.  
‘’I don’t think I’d even recognise it if I had.’’  
‘’A crush?’’  
‘’Yes.’’  
She was quiet again, for a while. I couldn’t help but wonder if she was implying that she’d never even had a crush on me, and that’s why she couldn’t recognise it now. It wouldn’t even surprise me. If I thought we were going through the motions, I can’t imagine what it must have felt like for her. At least I liked her enough not to break up with her.  
‘’I just. I never really felt the need to… I don’t know, I never really craved romance or affection.’’ Agatha finally said, breaking the silence. I raised my eyebrows at her.  
‘’Simon, I didn’t mean to offend you.’’  
‘’You didn’t.’’  
‘’I don’t know, there’s probably something wrong with me. I must be defective.’’ She said, brushing imaginary crumbs from the table. I couldn’t help but giggle again.  
‘’You’re defective because you don’t crave romance? I’m pretty sure that’s offensive to some people’’  
‘’What people?’’  
I laughed again and narrowed my eyes at her.  
‘’I don’t know. Some people aren’t interested in romance or sex, it’s a bit harsh to call them defective. Maybe you’re aromantic or something.’’  
Agatha was quiet again and she looked pained. I immediately stopped laughing.  
I hadn’t really considered it. That that might be an option.  
I cocked my head trying to make eye contact with her.  
‘’Are you?’’  
She looked up at me and shrugged, awkwardly. She’d been doing everything awkwardly since she sat down in front of me.  
‘’Maybe, I’ve never really thought about it.’’  
For some reason all of the sudden, all I could feel was a huge rush of relief.  
Mainly, I hadn’t expected her to tell me this, but it made sense in a lot of ways; our relationship felt forced, because it had been and not because I was imagining it or something. She had been forcing herself to be something that she wasn’t for a long time, and I almost felt guilty representing a part of her life that she felt trapped in.  
But besides that, telling her about Baz now, knowing that our relationship was already messy as it was, would be a lot easier. A lot. I mean, still horrible and awful, but a lot easier at least.  
I smiled at her, and she smiled back. I chuckled, and she threw her head back and laughed, and I think it must have been because she was relieved to get it off her chest. Or maybe because she realised this about herself for the first time and it gave her comfort.  
I was just about to tell her. I was just thinking about how to say it, how to bring it up casually, exactly what words to use, when Baz came barging in himself, almost like he knew I was about to tell her about him and he felt the need to make the announcement himself. He’s always had a thing for making dramatic entrances.


	3. Revelations

AGATHA

I immediately dialed Penny when I found out. The idea of Simon and Baz dating is just so weird that I kind of needed to hear from her that it’s true. She didn’t go into great detail as to how it happened, and what it’s like living with them now, but she did invite me to make gingerbread cookies, and I’m going to find out then. She offered to meet at her house but I really wasn’t in the mood to meet more than one pedantic Bunce at a time so I told her we’d meet at my place. I’m waiting for her now, nervously sat in my living room, obsessively checking the time on my phone until she gets here. It’s not just that I want to hear every single detail about Simon and Baz from her own lips — hearing it from her would somehow confirm for me, again, that it’s actually true — I’ve also missed her. We never really talked when I was away (I think she was a bit angry with me, though she never admitted it), and when we did talk it was about shallow stuff. 

When I left England to go to America, after everything that had happened, I didn’t want to talk to anyone about anything. Discussing my feelings or my problems with Penny, or Simon, or my parents for that matter, seemed fruitless and tiring. So, I made new friends, Normal friends, and magic never came up again. Returning now, even though I never planned to, and never wanted to, all these unfinished thoughts are rising up again. How I ended things with Simon, my relationship with my parents, my running away leaving Penny and Simon to work things out for themselves. I was tired of being involved in their dangerous adventures. I wanted my own adventures. And now, I have. Is it that strange that I can’t really enjoy my new adventures if my old ones feel unfinished?  
It did kind of annoy me that of course, as soon as I get back to the UK, something huge had to come out, so it was all about him again. It’s never just normal with Simon. It’s never just: I go to uni and I have a new girlfriend, and she’s all right. Of course not. He’s Simon Snow. With Simon it always has to be: I go to uni, I almost died, I’m gay and I’m dating my vampire nemesis. I was surprised we managed to get through our cup of coffee without like, a dragon or other creature attacking us.  
It was great seeing him. It’s always great to see him. He felt different though. I remember when we were at Watford, whenever you were near him, you could always feel his magic. The first time we met, it’s what drew me to him. It’s this pulling sensation, like he’s glowing and it’s drawing you closer every time he speaks or moves. After being with him for a few years I got used to the feeling and I didn’t notice it anymore. Maybe that’s why I didn’t feel it when we had coffee. Because I was used to it. But surely after spending all this time around Normals, his magic should have some effect on me, right?

Anyway, if Penny and I get the chance, I want to talk to her, as a friend and as someone who truly understands this world, this entire existence we’ve had alongside Simon, which is something I can never talk to my Normal friends about. I’m trying to figure out exactly what I want to ask Penny, when the doorbell rings. I get up and saunter to the front door. I saunter a lot since I moved to America. I no longer have to correct my figure every time one of my parents walks into the room.  
When I open the door, neither of us say anything as we just stare at each other uncomfortably trying to figure out what to say or do. When we talked on the phone, I hadn’t really considered how I should act around her. Talking on the phone is easy. You each pass along whatever message you have, and then you hang up. In real life, there’s body language, and social cues, and all sorts of tedious stuff. All of the sudden, Penny pushes the door open a bit further and throws her arms around me, pulling me into a warm hug. I slowly put my arms around her too, then pull back and tell her to come in.  
She does, and as she hangs her coat on the coat hanger she asks: ‘’How are you?’’  
My ex-boyfriend and ex-crush are apparently gay, and dating; I feel ashamed for being with you right now, pretending I didn’t leave you and said boyfriend to die last year, so all things considered, things are going pretty badly. How about you?  
‘’I’m good.’’, I say, and I guide her to the kitchen where the ingredients are already spread out.  
We stand in the kitchen, awkwardly, and I realise she isn’t going to make an effort to start a conversation, so I’m going to have to.  
‘’Tell me, how are you? How’s school?”, I ask upbeat.  
‘’It’s good. Honestly, it’s so great to go to a Normal university and meet all sorts of different people, not just magicians. You must understand what I mean. It’s refreshing, after years of being in a secluded, magickal atmosphere, it gives a nice change of pace.’’, she says.  
‘’Yes, that’s why I always liked to keep in touch with my Normal friends when I was at Watford.’’  
We’re quiet again, and I can tell she’s glancing up at me occasionally trying to figure me out.  
‘’How’s Micah?’’, I finally ask her, just to break the silence.  
‘’Actually, things are really great.’’, she says flustered. She pulls at her hair a bit, which, as always, looks atrociously untended, ‘’He might move here next year, finish college in London.’’  
I remember Micah. Last time I saw him we were in fourth year and I distinctly remember one ‘’double date’’ at night on the Great Lawn, which just ended up with me and Simon absent-mindedly glaring at Penny and Micah having an endless debate of wits, or discussing different magickal cultures with each other. Eventually I told Simon I wanted to leave, so we did. He kissed me goodnight, and we went our separate ways; I was off to the Cloisters, and he made his way to Mummers house. So you know, all in all, it was a great night.  
Whenever Penelope talked about Micah she got about as red as a tomato, then started talking about inspirational historical magicians to distract herself.  
I’m glad to see her so happy with him though. If the mere thought of him studying here next year can get her flustered, she must really care about him.  
We’re quiet once again, and I can tell we’re both suffering from all the unspoken words hanging in the air. I want to apologise. For everything. But first, curiosity gets the best of me.  
‘’Simon and Baz…’’, I say, and it’s all I manage to say about it for now. Penny starts grinning and repeats:  
‘’Simon and Baz…indeed’’  
‘’How did that even happen? It makes no sense!’’  
‘’Actually, when you think about it, it makes complete sense.’’  
I shake my head in disbelief, and she goes on to explain.  
‘’Simon was obsessed with Baz ever since they met. Do you remember fifth year? He was completely out of control. Drove me insane, really. He wouldn’t shut up about him. Actually followed him around every moment of every day. Baz told me later it drove him insane too. He was just starting to sort out his feelings for Simon, and he never got a single moment of peace to do so.’’  
I must look exasperated because Penny hastily says:  
‘’Your whole thing with Baz… I don’t know what that was. I think maybe Baz was just trying to piss Simon off by going after you—‘’  
‘’It’s okay’’, I cut her off, ‘’I think my feelings for him were about as absent as his feelings for me. If I ever did feel anything for him, it was because of the whole misunderstood-vampire-vibe he had going on.’’  
Penny shakes her head, grinning at the floor.  
‘’So you’re living together now?’’, I ask her.  
‘’Yes, we share a flat’’  
‘’Does he hang out there a lot?’’  
‘’Well, he lives there, so yes, naturally, he does.’’  
‘’No, I mean, Baz. Does Baz hang out there a lot?’’  
‘’Constantly.’’  
‘’What so they just hang out together?’’  
‘’Pretty much.’’  
‘’Without fighting or plotting to kill each other or anything?’’  
‘’They fight occasionally but usually it’s about nothing; just to get a rise out of each other, and they always make up.’’  
‘’And they make out and stuff?’’  
Penny rolls her eyes and sighs: ‘’Unfortunately, yes.’’  
I stare at the floor in disbelief for a while.  
‘’I just can’t believe it.’’, I finally manage to say.  
‘’Well if you want to see it with your own eyes, you can. Just walk into our home at any given time. They are constantly at it.’’  
I stare at her in disbelief again, which is something I’ve been doing a lot these days, and then I throw my hands up and turn to kitchen counter.  
‘’It’s always an adventure with Simon, isn’t it.’’, I say, slightly annoyed.  
Penny seems to sense my irritation and tries to soothe me saying: ‘’At least you got away.’’  
Which only gets the exact opposite reaction out of me, since I can’t really help but take it as an insult.  
‘’Well, that was uncalled for. You’re still angry with me then?’’, I say, gravely.  
She squints her eyes at me in confusion, and then quickly says:  
‘’No, I didn’t mean that. Sure, what you did is stupid and I disapprove, but it’s in the past. For now, I’m happy you’re back so we can see each other again. Like old times.’’  
I feel like apologising, but I also feel like I shouldn’t have to. She forgives me, and to be honest I don’t regret what I did. If I could go back, I’d run away again, or I would have anded up like the Mage, or Ebb.  
‘’I’m glad to be back too.’’, I say gratified with her answer. ‘’I actually’’, I say, looking down at the floor, ‘’carry a picture of the three of us in my purse.’’ I admit, and I can’t help but feel a bit ashamed while saying it.  
Penny’s face lights up as she says: ‘’Really?’’  
I go to grab my bag, and when I come back to the kitchen, Penny is sat up on the kitchen counter, swinging her legs back and forth in the air. I take out my purse, slip the picture out from it, and hold it up in front of her. It’s a picture of the three of us at Watford on the Great Lawn. The sun is shining and we’re sitting on the gras: Penny in the middle, Simon on her right and me on her left. It’s at the beginning of our fifth year. We looked so happy then. Nothing had tried to kill us yet that week.  
As she grabs the purse from my hand to study the picture, another picture falls out, whirling to the ground. Penelope looks up at me curiously, then jumps to the floor and kneels down to study it. I’d forgotten about that one. It’s the picture Penny’s mum gave me last year, of her, Lucy and the Mage.  
‘’Mum?’’, Penny asks in confusion as she squints her eyes studying the picture more closely. ‘’Is that the Mage? Why do you have this?’’  
‘’Remember when your mother told us about Lucy and the Mage? She gave me this picture when you went upstairs to talk to your dad.’’ I say, as I squat down next to her and gently brush her shoulder.  
‘’I remember. Why would you keep it?’’ She asks, looking at me, then down at the picture again.  
‘’I don’t know, I guess she kind of…inspired me in some way.’’ I answer, looking at Lucy in the photograph.  
‘’My mum?’’, Penny asks in confusion.  
‘’No’’, I say, ‘’Well, I mean, sure your mum too, but I meant Lucy.’’  
Lucy Salisbury, the girl who ran away from magic, even though no one understood why anyone would want to; it made me feel right about my decision to leave for America. ‘’You look a lot like your mother, you know.’’, I say, ‘’That same smirk.’’  
Penelope takes her eyes of the photo to roll her eyes and smile at me, then goes back to study it close to her face. ‘Lucy’, she murmurs, ‘she reminds me of Simon. Those bright blue eyes.’’  
‘She looks a lot like her mother, Lady Salisbury. I’ve seen her at the club.’’  
‘’Why does this picture inspire you?’’, Penny asks now, and as we stand up she puts the photograph down on the kitchen counter.  
‘’Apparently she was dating the Mage, and there was a kid involved, and then she ran away. Who knows, maybe she took that child to raise him as a Normal. Take him away from all this mess.’’, I say, shaking my head. I look over at Penny. Her forehead is wrinkled into a frown, and I can see she’s intrigued by the story. She’s staring into space, squinting.  
‘’I remember… Davy. So strange to think the Mage had a girlfriend. But, the Mage had a child? I don’t remember mum telling us that. Wouldn’t anyone know about it?’’  
‘’Maybe he doesn’t know. Maybe it wasn’t his.’’, I say, picking the photograph up from the counter again and studying the Mage’s face. Davy. Penny’s right: it is strange to think the Mage had a name, and a childhood. And a girlfriend. Maybe even a kid.  
‘’So this Lucy had a kid. Maybe with the Mage? And then she just disappeared?’’ Penny says, snapping me back from my thoughts.  
‘’It could all just be a rumour. Maybe there was no kid, and they just broke it off and she ran away to America.’’  
‘’But maybe there was. Maybe the Mage had a kid with this Lucy girl, and no one knows about it. Why wouldn’t anyone know about it?’’ She takes the photograph from my hands and flips it over. I know what it reads on the back. Lucy, Davy and I at Watford ’92. And Penny’s mum drew a little doodle of a sun next to their names.  
‘’She moved to California actually. It’s what made me want to go there too. It’s always sunny in California. Everyday is a sundress-day.’’  
Penny doesn’t say anything, still looking intently at the photograph.  
‘’Maybe Lucy didn’t tell the Mage. Maybe she died, or they gave it away, or she ran away with the kid, never looking back.’’, I say, because I can tell she’s expecting more information from me. This conversation is starting to bore me. I don’t care whether Lucy may have had a child or not. The photograph meant something to me because of what it represented; some sort of freedom. A chance to get away from things and make your own destiny. If Lucy could do it, so can I.  
But of course, somehow I’m wrapped up in some treasure hunt with Penny again.  
‘’Magicians don’t give up their kids…’’, she says thoughtfully, more to herself than to me. ‘’I suppose there’s only one person who would know.’’, she looks up at me with a calculating look in her eyes.  
‘’What do you mean?’’  
‘’You said it yourself, Lady Salisbury. You’ve seen her around the club, haven’t you?’’  
‘’Do you really want to go ask her about her missing daughter?’’, I snarl. ‘’Besides, what does it even matter? I don’t care what did or did not happen, it’s the idea of someone running away, of that possibility, that’s inspiring to me.’’  
‘’This isn’t about you.’’  
‘’Of course it isn’t’’, I say dryly, rolling my eyes.  
‘’Magicians don’t give up their kids, Agatha. They never do. Except who do we know who doesn’t have parents? The only magician’s kid who was left behind? The Chosen One. The Mage’s Heir. Bright blue eyes.’’  
I cock my head and squint my eyes at her, and then it dawns on me. ‘’You can’t be serious…’’, I utter.  
‘’I always am, Agatha. It all makes sense. Why would that stupid sword respond to him if he wasn’t actually the Mage’s heir? I don’t think ancient swords know how adoption works.’’  
‘’Simon’’, I say. And as I say his name it all starts to come together. The time adds up. It must have been around the late nineties when the kid was born. They look similar, Lucy and Simon. The same eyes, same curls, same cocky look on their face, like the world could throw whatever they wanted at them, and they’d face it head on. Simon’s bronze curls are a perfect combination of Lucy’s blonde locks and the Mage’s dark hair. And why else would the Mage have taken such an interest in Simon, such a fatherly interest in his wellbeing, even if he did turn out to be completely bonkers. The Mage, that is.  
‘’Aleister Crowley. We have to tell Simon.’’, I whisper, and Penelope’s head jerks up as she says: ‘’No. We have to find out whether it’s true first. Imagine telling Simon something like that, then finding out there was never a kid to begin with. We need to talk to Lady Salisbury, find out if she can tell us where Lucy lives. Maybe we can talk to her.’’  
‘’The club. We need to go to the club.’’


	4. Lady Salisbury

PENELOPE

We’re sitting in Agatha’s car — I’m not sure if it’s Agatha’s or her dad’s — driving to ‘the club’. I’ve never actually been there. I know Baz and Agatha used to go there all the time in the summer. But Baz hasn’t been there since he pretty much broke ties with his parents, and I imagine Agatha’s hasn’t talked to anyone there since she left for America either. I’m trying to figure out a delicate way to handle things when we get there. So far my plan is: let Agatha figure out how to go about things.  
But that’s a horrible plan. First of all, I don’t like leaving things up to someone else to work out.  
Second of all, I definitely don’t like leaving things up to Agatha to work out. She’d probably just float in there batting her eyes at Lady Salisbury, telling her how lovely her blouse is and we still wouldn’t have any information by the time the club closes. (Does it actually close? Is it a 24 hour party thing? Do they throw parties?)  
The club is quite a ways out of London, and it’s been about five hours since I left the flat to meet Agatha. Simon must be throwing a fit by now wondering whether Agatha’s still angry with him.  
If only he knew how irrelevant that is right now.  
I am definitely not telling him that that’s irrelevant right now.  
My phone starts buzzing and when I look at the screen, sure enough, it’s Simon.  
‘’Is that Simon? What should we say?’’, Agatha says, her eyes wide. Crowley, she’s acting like we’re planning an attack on parliament or something. Thank magic Simon called me, not her.  
‘’We aren’t doing anything. Just calm down. I’ll tell him I decided to go to my parents after leaving your place. He’ll be thrilled to know they’ll have the place to themselves.’’ I can practically see Agatha shiver when I mention Baz and Simon being alone at the flat, and it’s work not to roll my eyes. I answer my phone.  
‘’What, Simon?’’  
‘’Hello to you too, Penny.’’, Simon replies. I can tell he’s nervous.  
‘’I can’t really talk right now, Simon.’’  
‘’Right, I just wondered how it went with Agatha. Are you still with her?’’  
‘’It went fine.’’  
‘’I thought you said you would just stay for an hour or so’’  
‘’I did. I left a while ago, I’m at my parents, they asked me over for dinner—’’  
Just as I finish my sentence, a car charges past us, honking its horn several times, while it speeds ahead in the distance. Agatha curses aloud next to me, then quickly holds her hand over her mouth as if to shush herself.  
‘’What was that?’’, Simon ask suspiciously.  
‘’Nothing just, traffic from outside.’’  
‘’It sounded pretty loud’’  
‘’I’ve got to go, Simon, my dad is calling me down for dinner. I’ll see you tonight.’’  
‘’Wait, Penny—‘’ I don’t let him finish and hang up the phone.  
‘’I’m so sorry, I completely messed that up’’, Agatha says.  
‘’It’s fine, he’s way too clueless to think anything of it. Are we there yet?’’, I ask her, looking out the window. I don’t recognise anything out here. It’s all wide fields of grass and trees. There’s golf courses laying behind the line of trees alongside the road on the right, and there’s horse tracks on the left.  
‘’We’re almost there. We’re already on the terrain but the entrance is about ten minutes from here.’’  
‘’All of this is part of the club?’’ I say, gesturing out the window. We’ve been driving through the woods for a while now. It all looks perfectly tended. There’s fences alongside the road, painted dark black and they look perfectly pristine, like they were painted just this morning.  
‘’Yes, there’s tennis, golf and lacrosse courses, and horse tracks of course. There’s also a large part of woods that belongs to the club, some people have cabins here for holidays.’’  
I feel like telling her it all sounds like a big unnecessary posh joke, but I decide to just say nothing, and stare out the window. ‘’If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all’’, my mum always says. It’s a cliché, but I listen to her anyway.  
‘’What exactly is your plan, Penny?’’  
‘’I’m not sure yet’’, I answer her, a bit irked. I don’t like being unprepared. My main concern is that I don’t fit in at all. There’s nothing stealthy about Agatha going in there, not having been there for months, with a Bunce bouncing around the place, asking sensitive questions. My plan is: forget about stealth. We just want answers, and from what Agatha told me about Lady Salisbury in the car, she’s a confused old lady. Time has taken its toll on her, and she must miss her daughter to death. It’s sad really. Agatha told me she’s pining away in the Club, falling apart any time someone mentions Lucy.  
‘’That must drive you insane.’’, Agatha says all of the sudden.  
‘’What?’’  
‘’Not being sure what your course of action is.’’  
‘’Don’t you know me well.’’, I say sarcastically, looking out the window again.  
She asked me about Baz and Simon some more every now and then during the drive. I’m uninterested in explaining it further. They’re together now, they seem happy. That’s all there is to it. There’s more pressing matters now.  
I can’t help but feel she’s taking all of this a bit too personally. Even though she denied it, she must have had feelings for Baz, and she definitely had feelings for Simon. I never believed they were in love, but there must have been some feelings. Why else would she have stayed with him for so long?  
Then again, I don’t know what else I’d want to discuss with her. We could make small talk. Talk about uni, new friends we made or how the weather in Britain is always so depressing. But somehow it feels like making small talk is beneath us. We were friends for so long. Do we just go back to that? Is it even worth it? For all I know she could hop on the next plane out of here first thing tomorrow.  
I told Simon once, I don’t have room for many people in my life. There’s Simon, and Micah. And as strange as it is to admit it, Baz. Agatha left, and maybe now that she’s back, there simply isn’t any room for her in my life. I feel like maybe she feels the same.  
Of course I’ve grown to care about Baz. He makes Simon happy. And he’s the only person I can discuss British magickal history with for hours on end without either of us getting bored.  
Plus, when he isn’t making an exceptional effort to be an ass, he can be quite nice. I know it’s all for show anyway. Deep down, even if he doesn’t like to admit it, Baz is a big softie. You can see it in his eyes when he looks at Simon. All of the sudden he’ll let his guard down, and he’ll look…warm. Which is something I’d never imagined Baz being.  
Also, having Baz around these past years has been comforting. Simon was a complete wreck after what happened at Christmas. Baz, Simon and I celebrated new years at my place that year, but Simon nestled into the couch and didn’t bother to get off all night, not even to go outside and watch the fireworks. The loud noises scared him and finally, Baz managed to get him to sleep. He often does that. Baz always has a way of calming Simon, when I can’t. Then, once Simon is asleep, Baz and I talk for a bit and express our concern for him. It’s moments like those that I can’t imagine what my life would be like without Baz. I know he hates himself sometimes, or thinks he’s a bad person(or that he isn’t even really a person), but I disagree. Baz is a good person. He’s trustworthy, and he’d do anything for the people he loves. He’d do anything for Simon.  
Which is why not telling Baz about looking into Simon’s parents feels…wrong.  
But none of that matters right now. Agatha and I are the only two who know about this, and I’m planning on keeping it like that for now. We have to figure this out together, and then I have to figure out by myself how I’m going to tell Simon.  
We may have killed his father. There’s no good way to break news like that.  
We pull up on the large, pompous drive of what I’m assuming must be the infamous ‘club’. Agatha stops the car and a boy about our age walks up, taking her keys. I curl out of the car onto the semicircular red bricked turnaround in front of a huge grey roofed building. There are big, white pillars in front of the entrance, and you can see through the hallway into the large garden around back. There are posh people walking around all over the place.  
The valet gets into our car and I close the door, so he can drive away. Agatha doesn’t look like she feels out of place, but she definitely doesn’t look comfortable either. We both shuffle up the broad marble stairs and at the doors the doorman greets Agatha personally, and just gives me a look over, then nods his head.  
We walk in, and Agatha immediately turns right, heading for a large hall. It looks like a ballroom, large white pillars supporting the ceiling on either side of the room. There are large windows along the walls, and coffee tables and big, leather armchairs fill the room, leaving an open circle in the middle, where a piano stands. Someone’s playing it, quite beautifully. There’s a woman sitting in one of the leather armchairs next to it, humming along, silently. She has short, blonde hair with streaks of grey. She looks up at us.  
The whole room looks up at us. Which isn’t strange. We look completely out of place. I’m wearing stockings and a red blouse, tucked loosely into my skirt. Agatha is wearing blue jeans, a faded white top and a red cardigan she quickly threw on before we ran out the door. I’m guessing usually Agatha wears something more sophisticated when she comes here, but we were both so wrapped up in the revelation, we just headed straight for the door without considering anything else. Like a plan. Or a dress code.  
We shuffle awkwardly into the room, and immediately head for some empty leather armchairs in the corner, trying to call as little attention to ourselves as possible. We fail miserably, but it’s the effort that counts, mum always says. When we sit down, Agatha leans into my ear and whispers: ‘’That’s Lady Salisbury’, pointing discreetly at the lady sitting next to the piano.  
‘’She looks just like Lucy.’’ I whisper back at her  
‘’And like Simon.’’ she adds hesitantly.  
‘’Maybe that’s just what we want to see. We don’t know anything for sure yet.’’  
‘’What do we do?’’, she says looking at me, eyes wide.  
I frown at her. Because I don’t know. I turn in my seat and quickly glance at the lady. The pianist closes the piano, thanks the room and walks off and takes a seat with some other people she must know, at the window on the other side of the room. Lady Salisbury looks disappointed, as if she wanted her to keep playing.   
‘’We just have to go for it.’’, I say and I get up and walk over to her. Agatha immediately gets up and whispers my name, agitated, but I’ve already sat down in an armchair next to Lady Salisbury, and Agatha sheepishly sits down next to me, clutching her hands in her lap.  
At first, Lady Salisbury narrows her eyes at us, but when she recognises Agatha her face lightens up and her mouth curls into a smile. It looks about as fake as most of the women’s hair colour in this place, but it’s a start.  
‘’Agatha, darling, it’s lovely seeing you. How are you? My, I haven’t seen you around here in months.’’ Lady Salisbury says, completely ignoring me.  
‘’It’s very nice to see you again too, Lady Salisbury. I was actually in America this past year —‘’  
I clear my throat because none of this interests me and I feel like we need to stay focused. Agatha gives me an annoyed look. She clearly had a more stealthy approach in mind.  
‘’Can I help you?’’, Lady Salisbury says now, glancing at me with a bored look.  
‘’Hello, nice to meet you. I’m Penelope. Bunce. You might know my mother, she’s the headmistress of Watford—‘’  
‘’I’ve never heard of her, I don’t keep up with Watford news, I haven’t been there in years.’’, Lady Salisbury interrupts me.  
‘’Well you must have gone there all the time, right? Because of your daughter? She went there didn’t she?’’  
Lady Salisbury gives me a reproachful look.  
‘’We wanted to ask you something…’’ I start.  
‘’Then ask me something.’’, she says superciliously.  
‘’Right’’, I say and I can’t help but frown. She’s a bit rude, but then I suppose us barging in here and flopping down next to her isn’t exactly polite either. ‘’It’s about your daughter…’’  
‘’What about Lucy? Do you know something?’’, she says sharply. She’s not bored anymore, as she leans in closer to me.  
‘’Not exactly…’’ I say, hesitating a bit. She seems to be looking for answers as well. Maybe Lady Salisbury is as much use to us as that photograph. It was stupid to assume she’d know anything more about her daughter than most people do already. There’s so many rumours floating around. Why would Lucy’s mother know any better?  
‘’Could you just tell us what happened to her?’’,Agatha says sweetly, her brown eyes filled with sympathy as she leans in a bit closer as well. Lady Salisbury gives her a once over. She looks annoyed: she must hear this all the time.  
‘’What’s to tell…’’ Lady Salisbury says flatly, ‘’Most people claim to know everything already anyway, don’t they?’’ She sits back in her chair and crosses her legs.  
Lucy’s mum looks old and tired. Her eyes are filled with sorrow, even when she was singing that upbeat jazzy song at the piano. She’s wearing a beige pants suit with a copious amount of pearls around her neck, wrists and in her ears. Her hair is tucked behind her ears and it looks beautifully styled, like she’s a celebrity on the red carpet. I wonder how much time she spent getting it to look that way. Perhaps she hires someone to do it. Either way, it’s a waste of time. She looks suspiciously over her shoulder at the people behind us and murmurs: ‘’No one here seems to be able to mind their own damn business.’’  
I keep looking at her expectantly, hoping she’ll spill more. She reverts her attention to us and looks us up and down, looking bored again.  
‘’Look, I can’t help you girls.’’  
I don’t say anything and Agatha follows my lead, as we keep looking at her, our eyes pleading her to keep talking.  
‘’There’s nothing to tell.’’, she maintains, and I feel like just giving up. She has every right not to want to answer our questions. I didn’t expect her to either.  
Lady Salisbury is distracted again eyeing two women about her age on the other side of the room.  
‘’Carol is wearing that same scarf again, have you noticed, Agatha? Tell me, have you ever seen her without that Chanel scarf? It’s a disgrace really.’’  
She’s staring venomously at the dark haired lady on the other side of the room, sporting a silk navy scarf and a pastel pink pants suit.  
She probably can't afford buying anything new. Her husband was involved in that scandal earlier this year, have you heard? Crowley, what a tragedy that was.’’  
Lady Salisbury looks over at me, and my disgust must be very overt, because she wrinkles her nose at me and scoffs:  
‘’I suppose you wouldn’t care about Chanel.’’  
‘’Excuse me?’’ I answer sharply.  
No wonder Lucy ran away to America, she probably wanted to get away from this sharp tongued snake. Agatha cuts me off before I can continue: ‘’Mrs. Salisbury, I understand if you don’t want to tell us anything, that’s your prerogative, but I just wanted to tell you, before we go and leave you alone, I admire your daughter greatly.’’  
Lady Salisbury cocks her head and looks over at Agatha, locking eyes with her. Agatha gives her a hopeful smile.  
‘’Call me Ruth.’’ she says, nodding approvingly.  
‘’Ruth.’’ Agatha repeats. ’’Penelope’s mother, Mitali’’, Agatha says gesturing at me, ‘’told me about Lucy a few years back. She showed me a picture of her, they used to be friends at Watford.’’  
Lady Salisbury gives a nod of understanding. She looks nostalgic. Sentimental. ‘’I remember.’’  
She gives me the eye, her face practically scrunched up in disgust. She definitely doesn’t like me.  
Agatha reaches into her bag and fishes out her purse, taking the photograph out of it for the second time that day. She hands it to Lady Salisbury and keeps going: ‘’She’s beautiful. Her eyes are so blue, you can see the colour through the picture.’’  
Lady Salisbury takes the picture from her and eyes it carefully. She looks sad. So far, I’ve seen her bored, cold and disgusted, but not sad.  
‘’Her curls are beautiful, and her cheeks are so pink, they look like roses.’’ Agatha continues ‘’She looks just like her mother.’’  
Lady Salisbury and Agatha give each other a warm look, hunched over the photograph. A single, clear tear falls from Lady Salisbury’s eyes onto the photograph. She’s crying. I have no idea what to do. She probably does not want me around when she’s crying.  
‘’She was very beautiful, wasn’t she.’’, Lady Salisbury admits.  
‘’Was?’’ I blurt out. Subtlety has never been my strong suit.  
Lady Salisbury snaps her head at me and her face looks all twisted — apparently she saves those facial expressions just for me — and she glares at me.  
‘’She passed away.’’, She snarls at me, and I don’t know what to say or do.  
Mostly, I feel sorry for her, even if she’s been nothing but horrible to me since we stepped into the room.  
But then also, I’m surprised. I didn’t expect Lucy to be dead. On a different continent, sure. Maybe even changed names, that’s possible. I definitely expected our search to be difficult, but dead? And how does Ruth Salisbury know? Did they stay in touch when Lucy left for America? If so, perhaps she can tell us whether her daughter was pregnant and what happened to the child…  
Then I realise that Lucy is dead. Which means that if Lucy does turn out to be Simon’s mum, neither of his parents are alive. I don’t know what hope he has ever had to meet his parents, but if all of this proves to be true, he’ll never be able to meet them. He’ll never be able to get the answers he’s been looking for so long. He won’t be able to ask them why they gave him up.  
Magicians don’t give up their kids. Why did Lucy do it?  
‘’I’m sorry’’ I mutter. Lady Salisbury brings her attention back to the photograph, and a second tear escapes from the corner of her other eye. ‘’So am I’’, she says dryly.  
‘’I’ll go get you a drink’’ I say and I promptly get up.  
Lady Salisbury wipes the tear from her face then placidly says: ‘’Make that a double vodka martini. Thank you dear.’’  
‘’Fine.’’ I spit, walking away from the chairs. I still don’t like her, even if she’s a crying old lady. 

There must be a bar here somewhere. I look through the large windows and see servers walking around in the garden, so I decide I should ask them. I make my way across the ballroom when I feel someone’s eyes burning in my back. From the corner of my eye I can see there’s someone glaring at me intently. I turn my head to look over and I recognise him immediately. Stark widow’s peak, smug look on his face, sitting in a large leather armchair, glaring at me. Malcolm Grimm. Baz’ father. He’s wearing a pin-striped suit and he’s holding what looks like a glass of brandy. His hair is white and wavy, combed back over his head, just the way Baz does. Baz hasn’t been doing that as much lately. I think it’s because Simon said he likes it loose and wavy.  
At least Baz’ forehead isn’t humongous like his father’s. The widow’s peak only emphasises the size.  
This could easily blow our cover. If Malcolm Grimm tells his son we’re here, Baz’ll be onto us immediately and he’ll talk to Simon, and Simon will want to know what we’re up to. We’re lucky Baz only talks to his father once a month, and what are the odds of that monthly phone call being tonight? I decide not to worry about it right now, and break eye contact with Malcolm Grimm, wandering through the doors of the ballroom. For now, I need to focus on getting Mrs. Salisbury, the rudest most obnoxious person I’ve ever met, a double vodka martini. Well, maybe not the most obnoxious. Crowley, I’m I glad to be out of Watford so I’ll never have to share a bathroom with Trixie the Pixie ever again.

I can’t have been away for more than thirty minutes — this place is huge, it was like making my way through a maze— but when I return the scene has drastically changed. Lady Salisbury and Agatha are laughing. Agatha has taken my seat, and Lady Salisbury is stroking her hair and talking enthusiastically. When I get closer to them I hear they’re talking about braids.  
Braids. And Agatha wonders why I hate these country clubs so much. You couldn’t get me interested in talking about braids for a million pounds.  
I hand Lady Salisbury her drink and sit down in Agatha’s seat.  
‘’Thank you dear’’, she says leisurely, not even looking at me, and she continues talking to Agatha about hair dressers and how she had to yell at one last week because he had chosen the wrong shade of blonde hair dye.  
I wish she was joking.  
When I’m sat down Agatha and I give each other a quick look and she knows that I want her to stop getting sidetracked.  
Agatha laughs with Ruth after another one of her horrible stories and when the conversation dies down, another thirty minutes later, Agatha finally manages to get us on course again. I decided to just keep my mouth shut until we’re back in the car.  
‘’I’m very sorry for your loss, Mrs. Salisbury. It’s incredibly sad to hear your daughter passed away.’’ Agatha finally says. I think she purposely called her ‘Mrs Salisbury’ instead of Ruth to sound more innocent and sweet. I have never been prouder of Agatha in my life.  
‘’Thank you, darling.’’ Lady Salisbury says.  
‘’I hope you don’t mind me asking, but what happened to her?’’  
Lady Salisbury looks over at her and hesitates. Agatha had spent near an hour trying to gain this woman’s trust — and it can’t have been easy — and I can tell she’s considering telling us about her daughter.  
Agatha decides to push it a bit further to take it home.  
‘’I want to know the truth, not some stupid rumours. I feel like Lucy deserves more than that.’’  
I think Agatha purposely says ‘I’ and not ‘We’ in the hopes that Lady Salisbury will just forget about my existence entirely. She does. Lady Salisbury’s eyes light up when she hears her daughter’s name, and she grabs Agatha’s hand tightly putting her other hand on top, stroking her hand gently. ‘’Thank you, Agatha. She does.’’  
Maybe I was wrong. Agatha could prove to be of more use than I thought. She just has more natural empathy than I do. I feel like empathy is a waste of time. I have my own problems to care about, why should I waste my time caring about other’s?  
Lady Salisbury nods hazily and it looks like she has decided something.  
‘’Come with me’’, she whispers all of the sudden, dropping Agatha’s hand and getting off the leather armchair. She walks out of the massive ballroom and we’re not far behind, and I can see Baz’s father following us with his eyes again as we walk through the doors. We follow her through the country club, through a few hallways and doors, onto the large lawn, which I already saw through the windows in the ballroom. It had just been raining, so the lawn is empty. She pulls us into a small spot between two large, marble pillars, looks over her shoulder to make sure no one is around, and starts talking. 

‘’I’ll tell you right now: I don’t know what happened to my daughter.’’ She starts hesitantly.  
She doesn’t say anything for a while, and it looks like she’s deciding what to say.  
‘’Of course we had our problems, all mothers and daughters do’’   
She pauses again. I study her intently. Her hair looks perfectly tended. It's blond, the type of blonde that's a perfect mixture of white and yellow. There's something incredibly beautiful about her, which bothers me for some reason. Maybe it's the contrast of her pale, spotless skin, yellow hair, pink lips and deep blue eyes. She looks like she could have been a barbie doll back in the day.   
‘’But she never ignored me. We always talked at least once a week. Oh, maybe our talks were no good - we were too different - but I loved her, I always loved her and she knew that.’’  
I let my eyes float around the lawn. There's a few tennis courts, tall bushes and unnecessarily pompous statues, depicting greek nymphs and satyrs, and a small square with tables and large parasols to offer some shade from the sun. There is no sun today, so the grass looks soggy and the magic of it all is far to be found. For some reason, whenever I think of luxury, I always imagine it with sunny weather. As if rich people wouldn't have to deal with the rain.   
‘’I tried calling her; no reply. I sent several birds, none of them even returned. I’m convinced it was that stupid git sabotaging my attempts to contact her. He must have taken her phone and killed off all of those birds in cold blood, one by one. Why else wouldn’t she want to contact me?’’ She says. She must be talking about the Mage. I can’t help but feel uncomfortable with her calling him a stupid git, but then again, the Mage was pretty much responsible for Baz’ mum’s death and Baz being a vampire, so I definitely wouldn’t argue that he isn't.  
‘’Oh, I didn’t know what to think when it all happened.’’, she says, forlornly, ‘’First she spent all that time with that no good fool of a boy,’’ — the Mage — ‘’but she always touched base with me every now and then. Then all of the sudden: nothing.’’  
A small path runs through the lawn. If you were to follow it, it would lead you to a small pavilion with a gazebo. I can barely see it, but I'm able to make out rays of water being pumped up into the air; a fountain with another large statue in the middle. So ridiculously pompous. It's not Greek this time. It's the Roman god Janus. Famously known for having two faces; he was the God of beginnings, he looked both into the past and into the future. He was also the god of duality. I'd like to think he's the reason Normals call some people 'two-faced'. Perhaps the Mage had two faces as well. Both a loving husband and an insane, power hungry, Machiavellian politician, obsessed with prophecies and revolutions. I'm losing my patience with Lady Salisbury. Why did she take us aside and decide to tell us this story, if just now she herself asked us quite frantically if we knew anything about her daughter? Surely, she can’t know much herself.   
‘’ You know, I looked at her and saw myself. It was like looking into a mirror. Those long yellow-blond curls. Those blue eyes, her little rosy apple cheeks. My little rosebud girl, I used to call her…’’ She’s staring into space, as if trying to picture her daughter again, and I cough to break the silence. Lady Salisbury’s head snaps to me and she furrows her brow. She definitely likes Agatha better than me.  
‘’Two years ago—‘’ She starts, but her breath catches and she clears her throat to get herself to continue.  
Agatha told me on the way over to the club that from what her mother had told her, Lady Salisbury — Ruth — was quite a chipper woman, until two years ago, a bit before the Christmas disaster. It’s hard to imagine that the woman standing in front of us now is that same woman who sang upbeat jazzy songs all day and generally was the life of the party. She seems bitter now. And lonely. She sat alone in the ballroom, and she immediately lit up when Agatha took an interest in her.  
‘’When the Veil opened…’’ She starts again. ‘’She tried to come through. I swear I saw her in my home one late evening around Halloween two years ago and at first I thought I was hallucinating.’’  
She opens her mouth to say something, then closes it again. Agatha puts a hand on her shoulder and tries to comfort her.  
‘’She said she loved me so… and that she was very sorry, and I kept asking her: ‘Why are you sorry, my darling?’ ‘’, Lady Salisbury finally says.  
I look over at Agatha and we lock eyes, while Lady Salisbury gathers her thoughts. Agatha strokes Ruth’s back trying to soothe her. I can’t be bothered to try to help. She doesn’t like me anyway.  
‘’What else did she say?’’, I ask her ardently. Agatha looks over to me and shoots me a look that says: stop being rude. And she’s right, because we shouldn’t blow our chances of getting the information we need, but I finally feel like we’re getting somewhere. We’re so close, all we need is some sort of link.  
My little rosebud girl… When did I hear that before?  
‘’What Penelope means’’ Agatha says forcefully, flashing me an annoyed look ‘’is that that must have been very hard for you. Did she manage to come through for long?’’  
‘’Sadly, no.’’ Lady Salisbury says, ignoring me again and looking over at Agatha while she talks.  
‘’All she managed to say after that was that she left something behind… and I needed to take care of it.’’, she murmurs and another tear rolls over her cheek. ‘’I have no idea what she’s talking about. It could be anything. My rosebud girl, my poor sweet Lucy.’’  
‘’What could she have left behind? An item of some sort? A family heirloom?’’, Agatha asks her.  
‘’I haven’t the faintest clue. She ran away a few years after her graduation, I’m absolutely positive he convinced her. She would never have done something like that. Just run away. Not unless there was something else going on.’’ Lady Salisbury sounds venomous when she talks about the Mage, spitting every word. She can’t even say his name. I don’t think she wants to acknowledge his existence, or his recent death.  
‘’She left everything she had behind then, it can’t have been anything from home.’’ Lady Salisbury adds. ‘’I worried then…I worried then she might be pregnant.’’ She says gravely.  
‘’It was that evil, no good man, I tell you. He must have killed her and the child unscrupulously.’’ She says, and she’s staring into space again like she could kill him. Agatha is looking at her, eyes filled with sympathy. ‘’That’s horrible.’’ Agatha says.  
‘’It’s just speculation, of course. That’s all I can do, is speculate what might have happened, because she couldn’t tell me more. Perhaps in twenty years she’ll come back, but I’ll be long dead by then.’’ Lady Salisbury says flatly, and Agatha and I look at her awkwardly. How do you respond to someone acknowledging their own near death?  
‘’We should go back’’ Agatha mutters quietly, and Lady Salisbury turns to her and nods hazily.  
‘’We should, or I might bore you to death with more of my stories.’’, Lady Salisbury says, chuckling.  
Agatha shakes her head no and says some sweet meaningless words, reassuring her that she appreciated the story, and that she planned on coming back more often so Ruth might tell her more of her stories. Lady Salisbury takes a mirror out of her purse and quickly checks on her make-up, wiping some mascara off her cheekbones, and then we start making our way back. Agatha and Ruth are chattering some more about people I don’t know and posh hobbies I don’t care about, so I walk behind them a bit sorting my thoughts. I wonder why Ruth took us outside to tell us about Lucy. Perhaps she's embarrassed. Or perhaps the other guests have grown tired of her endlessly going on about her daughter. I don't blame her. If my daughter were to vanish in thin air and show up years later, as a ghost, I'd go insane too. That's why I don't want children. They're an unnecessary way of giving yourself more weaknesses.   
We drop her off in the ballroom again. She stops to thank Agatha and gives me an indifferent nod, then turns around and walks out of the room. Perhaps she decided to go home as well. I turn around and drag Agatha with me, ignoring Baz’ father still glaring at us from his armchair one last time.

As we stand outside, waiting for the valet to fetch our car, I’m running bits of what Lady Salisbury said through my head again. She seemed to be convinced that the Mage had killed Lucy, and after everything that happened in the Chapel, and everything we found out about him, that wouldn’t even surprise me.  
‘’You’re about as subtle as a sledgehammer, aren’t you.’’, Agatha says suddenly, actually fuming.  
‘’We got what we needed didn’t we?’’  
‘’You could have been a bit more sensitive. People know me around here, you know.’’  
‘’I doubt Lady Salisbury is going to want to tell this whole story to someone again. Besides, what do you care? You haven’t been here in over a year, and you’ll be leaving again soon. Who cares about these posh, stuck up noblemen anyway.’’  
She’s quiet, and we don’t say anything for a while, until we see the valet drive up.  
‘’Actually, I’m not sure if I’m leaving again soon.’’ Agatha says and she walks over to the car as the valet gets out and hands her the keys. ‘’Thank you’’, she says, handing him a few pounds. When did she even get those out of her purse? Did she even bring a bag? We get into the car and put our seat belts on.  
‘’What do you mean you’re not leaving soon? Don’t you have to go back to uni at some point?’’  
‘’I don’t know, I thought I might stay for a while’’ She says starting up the car and driving off.  
‘’Well even if you do stay, it’s a waste of time going to this stupid club every weekend trying to please people you don’t like, eating fancy food, you can’t even stomach.’’ I say, lifting up my chin.  
‘’Oh come off it, Penelope. Why do you have to put the club down so much? To feel better about yourself? You don’t go to the club. Why, because you’re too much of an intellectual to waste your time there? Whatever, Penny, we all have our lives set for us anyway, you don’t need to put my life down to feel better about yours.’’  
I want to respond, but I don’t have anything to say. That might have been the first time Agatha and I had a fight. In fact, that might have been the first time Agatha ever told me off. I’m too tired to talk back, and honestly my mind is somewhere else trying to sort everything out with Lucy and Simon and Ruth. I just want to go home — my parents’ home that is — to take a breather and figure it all out, so I just growl and stare out the window murmuring:  
‘’Just take me to my parents.’’


	5. All Right Then

BAZ

We’re in the kitchen, Simon and I, trying to figure out what we want to eat for dinner. It’s way past dinner time, but we haven’t eaten anything yet and we want something that’s quick and easy to make.  
‘’I just want to warn you beforehand that if you even so much as think about suggesting scones, I will walk out of here this second.’’, I say to him as I look at my phone, scrolling past numerous recipes.  
‘’I didn’t even say anything!’’, he says apologetically, then he opens a drawer and starts flicking through take-out menus.  
‘’Pizza?’’, he suggests.  
‘’Not really in the mood for pizza’’  
‘’Indian?’’  
‘’No, how about we make a lasagne?’’, I reply.  
‘’Too much work’’, he answers, and I can’t help but roll my eyes.  
‘’How about I just go get some fish and chips from down the street.’’, he finally suggests looking up at me hopefully, and I can tell he isn’t in the mood to put any more effort into dinner tonight, so I give him an approving nod and put my phone on the counter. He walks over to me, slipping his arms around my waist and starts kissing me on my cheek, then slowly heads down, placing tentative kisses on my jaw and neck, then he cups my cheeks with his hands and carefully fills the gap between our lips. I kiss him back, running my hands through his curls and over his back. He leans back, and I open my eyes to look at him questioningly.  
‘’What did I do to deserve that?’’, I ask him,  
‘’Well you can’t expect me to do nothing when you’re wearing jeans, Baz.’’ He says, going to grab his coat.  
It never fails to amuse me how much my wearing jeans still surprises him. He must think I just sit around the house all day wearing silk scarves and looking at pocket watches while smoking cigars. I only own a pocket watch because Daphne insisted on giving me and father one, so we would own matching accessories. Neither of us ever so much as took it out of the box.  
Simon has his coat on and he’s opened the door, but he’s standing in the doorway hesitantly. I cock my head and walk over to him. ‘’All right, Snow?’’  
He shakes his head, but he’s looking at the ground and I can tell he’s too wrapped up in whatever thoughts are rushing through his head to be honest with me. Or perhaps he just doesn’t want to be honest to me.  
‘’It just doesn’t feel right’’, Simon says finally lifting his head.  
I immediately think about Agatha. My stomach sinks as I take a step closer to him and cock my head. ''What, love?" I ask him, holding my phone in one hand and stroking his cheek with the other. ''Penny... I don't know, she was obviously lying just now.'' He lifts his hand and puts it on top of mine, still resting on his cheek. He looks up into my eyes, and he looks both nervous and insecure. He looks down and laughs, but it sounds stale. ''It's been a long time since I've actually talked to Agatha, I'd like to think the other day wasn't the last time.'' ''It won't be, Simon.'' ''How are you so sure?'' I can't help but roll my eyes, and he immediately lifts his hand from mine and shakes off my hand. ''What?'' ''It's just--why do you even care? She left you to die, Simon. I understand she meant a lot to you, but she dropped you like a hot brick as soon- as soon as things started to... heat up. Doesn't that bother you?'' ''Well it clearly bothers you.'' ''Of course it does." ''Because you're jealous.'' I take a step back, and look at him: his face is red, but he can't look me in the eyes, like he immediately regretted saying it as soon as the words left his mouth. I look away and force myself to stop frowning. As soon as I've settled my face, I let out an exasperated sigh, then look at him again. We lock eyes, his look apologetic and mine look--so I hope--cold. ''Yes, because I'm jealous, for some part. But for the most part because I truly believe she betrayed you. And as much as I'd like to smack you right now, I care about you. I don't want you to get hurt. Again. There's nothing stopping her from getting on another flight out of here like she did last time." He nods quietly, averting his eyes again. ''I'm sorry, I shouldn't have accused you of--'' ''It's alright, you weren't wrong.'' I say pointedly. ''But I wasn't right either. And I hope you know that I would never underestimate you like that. As if you don't have my best interests at heart.'' This time, I nod quietly, but I look him in the eyes reassuringly. He laughs and puts his hands over his face like he feels ashamed.  
I take a step closer to him, so there’s barely any space between us, and very slowly remove his hands from his face. ‘’There, all better.’’  
He smiles up at me and I kiss him then because I can. I make it last as long as I can, but interrupt myself because I desperately feel the need to tell him something. To reassure him. Or to reassure myself.  
‘’I love you." I say. I know he knows it already.  
I don’t tell him a lot. Perhaps I don’t tell him enough, but he knows. He knows because I tell him when it’s late and I’m tired, or when it’s early and my brain is still fuzzy, or when he catches me off guard with something very romantic or cute. Which is more often than I’d like to admit.  
‘’I love you too, Baz.’’ I smile at the floor, and he gives me a quick peck on the lips, then pulls back.  
  
He turns around and asks: ‘’All good back there?’’  
I inspect his back carefully, then quickly tap on his wings and murmur: ‘’There’s nothing to see here!’’  
I’ve gotten better at that spell. There used to be a chance the spell wouldn’t just work on his wings but on all of him, causing people to constantly run into him, but Penelope and I have gotten used at using the spell at a more targeted area. He turns around again and thanks me, then goes for the door.  
‘’Don’t worry I’ll be back soon!’’ he says jokingly and I smile at the ground as he slams the door excitedly.  
I walk over to the couch, when my phone starts buzzing on the kitchen counter. I figure it’s Simon, trying to be cheeky, ringing me as soon as he leaves the building — he sometimes does this to annoy me — but when I pick up my phone I see it’s my father. Why would he be calling me now? I just spoke to him last week.  
‘’Father?’’, I say holding the phone to my ear.  
‘’Basilton.’’ he says and then ‘’How have you been?’’ sounding bored as always.  
‘’I’m fine. How’s Daphne?’’ I ask, already knowing the answer. I spoke with her yesterday.  
Do other children make small talk with their parents?  
‘’She’s fine.’’, he says curtly.  
For a while neither of us say anything, which is usually how our phone calls go. He calls me, we make small talk, we’re quiet for a while, and when my father feels like we’ve spoken an appropriate amount of time, he’ll hang up after saying his signature: ‘’All right then.’’  
‘’What are you up to, Basilton?’’ He says now. This isn’t scripted. I have no idea what to respond, because I have no idea what he’s talking about. Perhaps he heard about our encounter with Agatha a few days ago, but why would he care about that? Does he want me to keep my relationship a secret from her?  
‘’I’m not quite sure what you’re referring to, father.’’, I answer him, trying to sound bored the way he always does.  
‘’I’m referring to your little friends skulking around the club, taking an interest in Lady Salisbury of all people.’’, he says, and though he sounds bored, the fact that he’s calling to tell me this tells me he’s genuinely curious about my 'devious plan'. I don’t even know Lady Salisbury that well, let alone take any interest in her. Of course I’ve seen her around the club. That irritating old lady cannot be separated from the piano, always singing her dull love songs and telling bawdy jokes. What little friends is he even talking about? Does he mean Dev and Niall? Surely he knows they’re not really my friends anymore.  
‘’ I have no clue what you’re talking about.’’, I tell him.  
‘’That Wellbelove girl and the headmistress’ annoying daughter.’’  
‘’Agatha and Penelope?’’ My attempt at sounding bored already failed.  
‘’That’s them. Disappeared with Ruth Salisbury into the garden for about an hour, then returned and walked straight out.’’  
I quickly clear my throat trying to return to my state of boredom.  
‘’I had no idea they went to the club.’’  
‘’So you’re not involved?’’  
‘’No, father.’’  
‘’Are you sure, Basilton?’’  
‘’I’ve got nothing to do with it father’’, I reassure him.  
‘’All right then’’, he says.  
‘’Goodbye, father.’’, I say, and he hangs up.

I don’t waste a second and immediately dial Penelope. She doesn’t pick up the first time. I try again, and she answers, already sounding irritated.  
‘’What, Basil?’’  
‘’No need to get hostile with me, Bunce. I was just calling to ask what you and Wellbelove were up to at the club.’’  
She’s quiet, which tells me enough. They’re hiding something.  
‘’You talked to your father, then?’’ She finally says.  
‘’You’re not answering my question, Bunce.’’  
‘’Just calm down, Baz, Agatha and I went along to the club with her parents.’’  
‘’Don’t lie to me’’, I snap. I hate lying, and Bunce is horrible at it. So is Simon. Plus, no one can out-lie me. I am the master-liar. I had to lie about my feelings to everyone I knew for years. Telling a lie is easier to me than telling the truth. ’’Father told me about your romantic garden walk with Ruth Salisbury, the mad lady.’’  
‘’Don’t call her that, Baz.’’ Agatha chips in.  
‘’Am I on speaker phone?’’ I say, annoyed.  
‘’Agatha made me.’’ Penelope answers, also sounding irritated.  
Neither of them say anything, so I push further.  
‘’Well, Bunce? What are you two up to? You told Simon you were at home having dinner with your parents, which honestly was a terrible lie to begin with since you people never eat together, when actually you were out playing detective with Wellbelove.’’  
‘’Just leave it, Baz.’’, Penelope sighs and I can tell she must be exhausted because normally she wouldn’t be so stupid to think that I would just leave it.  
Instead I say: ‘’Do you want me to tell Simon about your little excursion, or do you want to tell me what’s tickling your fancy?’’  
‘’Simon isn’t with you right now?’’, Penelope asks me.  
‘’He’s out getting food.’’ I reply.  
‘’Look, Baz, you really can’t tell him about this.’’ Agatha says, and I can hear Penelope sighing in the background. She was probably planning on playing this off like it’s unimportant so I’d stop prying, but if Agatha didn’t blow their cover already, I was way too curious to begin with anyway.  
‘’Why?’’ I say suspiciously ‘’What did you discuss with Lady Salisbury?’’  
‘’It’s about Simon’s parents…’’ Agatha says, and I can hear Penelope cursing and spitting out Agatha’s name under her breath.  
‘’What about his parents?’’ I say sharply. ‘’We don’t know who his parents are.’’  
‘’Well, that might not be the case anymore.’’ Penelope says dryly.  
‘’I’m coming over.’’ I say, crossing the kitchen to grab my coat.  
Penelope immediately protests: ‘’Baz, no. You can’t alarm Simon by leaving. It’d be too suspicious, and we don’t want him to know about this. Imagine telling him we might know who his parents are, only to find out later that we were wrong.’’  
‘’Who do you even think his parents are?’’, I snarl, not ceasing my efforts to put on my coat with one free hand.  
‘’Baz, stop putting on your coat.’’ Penelope says. She must have heard me struggling through the phone. ‘’You can’t tell Simon anything, you have to stay there and do whatever gross couple things you always do until we know more.’’ She continues.  
‘’Do you expect me to lie about this to Simon indefinitely? Who knows when you two idiots find out the truth. No, I’m coming over and I’m taking over this investigation.’’  
‘’Baz—‘’  
‘’I’ll see you at Wellbelove’s.’’, I say and I hang up the phone.

Penelope promptly calls me back, but I ignore it as I write a hurried note to Simon.  
Fiona’s back, she lost her key. I went back to let her in. I’ll see you tomorrow. Baz.  
That shouldn’t be too suspicious. I do feel bad about leaving him so abruptly, after the conversation we had before he left. I imagine him walking into the empty flat, looking for me but not finding me and eating two portions of fish and chips by himself. He probably wouldn’t mind that very much. He usually eats two anyway, he always eats half of whatever I’m eating. I don’t mind, I feel like after all his summers in children’s homes, he should enjoy being able to eat as much as he can, whenever he wants to.  
I walk out of their flat and cautiously make my way across the hallway, then down the stairs, listening for footsteps and looking out the windows to check if Simon might be coming back. I quickly cross the street walking the opposite direction of where I know he must have gone to get the fish and chips. I keep walking until I get on a busy street, then signal for a taxi and get in. It’s been a while since I went to the Wellbelove’s. I remember being there once in the summer between our fifth and sixth year. Her parents hosted a high tea in their garden. There were at least a hundred people walking around, most of them I knew from the club. Snow wasn’t there. I don’t think the Mage allowed Penelope or Agatha to contact him over the summer. I remember Agatha spent the whole evening glaring at me, trying to get my attention and subtly trying to get close to me. I didn’t speak to her the entire evening, but I did walk past her while she was talking to some old couple in the kitchen, and gave her a long, cool look, just like the one I had given her in the dining hall when I returned to Watford last year. I enjoyed teasing with her then, just so I could feel like what Agatha and Simon had was fragile, and I could ruin it whenever I wanted to. But I didn’t want to. There was one thing I wanted very badly, and it wasn’t to tease with Wellbelove.  
Anyway, I have it now. And I care about it a lot. And if Wellbelove and Bunce are up to something, or know something concerning it, I want to be a part of it.  
I’ll make sure I’m a part of it.


	6. My Rosebud Girl

PENELOPE

‘’This is just great’’, Agatha says, as I try, for the third time, to reach Baz. He’s probably purposely ignoring me, already making his way through London to Agatha’s house as we speak.  
‘’Merlin, he is just impossible. Im-possible I tell you. Stubborn as a mule. He probably thinks he’s taking over this operation like some sort of a suave Sherlock Holmes.’’, I mutter, staring at my phone.  
‘’I’m not even back a week, or we’re solving mysteries together, and now Baz of all people is joining our team.’’ Agatha sighs.  
‘’Merlin, Agatha, get over it already. Baz and Simon are together, it doesn’t surprise me that Baz wants to join our team, he’s been on our team for a while. What annoys me is that you let him find out in the first place." "I let him find out? How about you?", She angrily interjects. \- "Or that he’s so persistently stupid to ignore the fact that all three of us suddenly disappearing is incredibly suspicious.’’  
‘’When did you find out about them, anyway?’’, she asks, clearly not listening to what I said.  
‘’After the incident at the Chapel.’’, I say, and I almost laugh at my choice of words. Incident. That might be the biggest understatement of the year.  
‘’But how? Did they sit you down one day and tell you?’’  
‘’Directly after the incident. I already picked up on some clues before, though. Ever since Simon jumped out of the car to ‘make sure Baz was okay’, I knew something was up. Then Baz insisted on delaying Simon’s confrontation with the Mage and Baz was frantic when he found out Simon had left already to talk to the Mage after the Christmas disaster. And I remember being extremely confused when Baz casted ‘’On love’s light wings!’’ in the Chapel, because you have to be hopelessly in love to do that, and who could he be in love with? The Mage? Ebb the goatherd? Me?’’ I say distracted trying to dial Baz again, to no avail. We’re nearing the city centre now, and I think Baz will probably already be there by the time we get to Agatha’s.  
‘’What do you mean, 'confrontation'?’’ Agatha asks, and I realise we’ve never talked about the incident at the Chapel before. I don’t even know why she was there, and she must not know why we were there either. I can’t imagine how confused she must have been seeing me and Baz rushing past her to get to Simon.  
‘’Have you been living under a rock for the past year? Haven’t you read any newspapers, or watched telly or something?  
‘’I haven’t. I just ran from the Chapel, went straight home and packed my bags. I didn’t bother keeping up with UK magickal news when I was in America.’’  
‘’Oh’’, is all I manage to say. I thought she’d at least know a few things, a few main things. Maybe she’d read the papers, or Simon had told her, but apparently she doesn’t know anything about what happened.  
‘’Well, to summarise: Simon was the Humdrum and every time he used magic he opened a hole, and Baz finally connected the dots and told Simon, and then Simon decided to tell the Mage.’’  
‘’Wait, what? Simon…was the Humdrum? I don’t understand…’’ She utters. She grabs the steering wheel firmly and steers the car to the side of the road. She takes the keys out of the ignition and looks at me in disbelief, waiting for some sort of an explanation. .  
"Agatha, we don't have time for this." "Oh, we bloody do." I pause for a second to figure out a way to explain it to her clearly. ‘’His magic, Agatha, it was always faulty. It was too strong. It was impossible, and that’s exactly what it was. His magic was impossible, so every time he used it, he tore some sort of hole in the magickal atmosphere.’’ I explain to her hurriedly, as I take the keys from her and put them back in the ignition.  
She slaps my hand away and takes the keys back from me. ‘’A hole?’’, She asks. She’s staring at my lap and I can see she’s trying to put everything together. I sigh and realise that we won't be leaving any time soon, unless I explain everything to her first.  
‘’The Christmas disaster in Hampshire. Simon and Baz got attacked by the Humdrum.’’  
‘’Yeah I remember, my mum told me that’’ Agatha interrupts me.  
‘’Well, actually, The Humdrum was just an echo, and he tried to agitate Simon to get some sort of reaction out of him, to create more holes. So the Humdrum turned Baz against Simon, but Simon started pouring his magic into Baz to save him, thus creating a hole, a dry spot, so Baz told him to go — to protect him from his parents — and so Simon grew wings and a tail and flew to my house." "Wings?", She asks, looking at me like I'm a deranged person. "Yes, wings. He still has them. They are stupid and useless, they don't work." "He still has them?" "Yes, and a tail. Keep up. So, Baz came shortly after and explained his theory to us. Then Simon got really upset and decided to go tell the Mage, but Baz insisted that he stay and go with him to talk to the Numpties again about his mother, but Simon refused, so Baz went to talk to the Numpties, and Simon grew wings again and flew to the Chapel—‘’  
‘’— Which is where we ran into each other.’’, Agatha murmurs.  
‘’What happened between you and the Mage?’’ I ask her. I've never actually asked her before. When we talked to her outside the gates I didn’t get the chance. She was running away, and Baz and I were running... towards. Agatha and I haven’t talked about the incident ever since.  
‘’Mum told me about the Hampshire disaster, and that you and Simon were missing, and I thought maybe Baz was luring Simon into some sort of trap to kill him, so I went to Watford to tell the Mage everything I knew, so he could help Simon, but when I found him in the Chapel, he looked maniacal. Honestly, he was like, completely bonkers. He had blue crap on his chest and he was yelling and he pinned me to the ground, and Ebb the goatherd came to save me and told me to run, so I got the fuck out of there.’’  
Agatha is rambling, and I can tell it’s been a long time since she’s talked to anyone about this. I almost feel bad for making her think about this again, but then I remember that I asked her to stay and help us and she refused and I don’t feel so bad anymore.  
‘’What happened when you and Baz went in?’’, Agatha asks me.  
‘’There was smoke everywhere and you could feel Simon’s magic in the air, and when Baz spelled us up to the attic, Simon was holding the Humdrum, pouring magic into him. Ebb the goatherd was dead on the ground. After a while the Humdrum disappeared, and the Mage freaked out and tried to kill Simon, so Baz flew up and attacked the Mage, and then I casted a ‘’Simon says!’’ and Simon begged them to stop hurting him, so they did. Baz let go of the Mage and the Mage… well he died.’’ I say. I can’t really think of a more delicate way of saying it. Agatha doesn’t look surprised to hear about the Mage dying, so I assume she must have heard about that at least. It’s almost impossible for anyone not to know that. It definitely made international news too. Even the Americans must have talked about it amongst each other.  
‘’Simon killed the Mage…’’ Agatha says, looking up at me. ‘’Simon killed his dad?’’  
"I killed his dad. This was all my fault." "But still..." Agatha says. I lock eyes with her, clenching my hands in my lap.  
‘’The Humdrum just disappeared? Because Simon gave him some of his magic?’’ Agatha says, baffled.  
‘’Not some, Agatha. All. He gave him all of his magic.’’  
‘’What do you mean?’’  
‘’It’s gone. His magic, it’s gone, he gave all of it to destroy the Humdrum.’’  
‘’Simon lost his magic?’’ Agatha looks really upset. She’s staring through the window at the cars outside flashing over the street.  
‘’He lost his magic to protect the world of Mages’’, I say, gravely.  
Agatha doesn’t say anything so I talk some more to avoid the silence.  
‘’So Simon lost his magic, and he still had his wings and tail. He broke down on the ground after he realised he had killed the Mage, and Baz went over to comfort him. Then he called Simon love, and everything started to come together.’’  
‘’I thought Baz was trying to lure Simon into a trap…’’ Agatha says. She looks disoriented.  
‘’He wasn’t.’’ I say, looking curiously at Agatha. She seems very upset at hearing about what happened to Simon. I can’t help but feel surprised, though it’s not like Agatha doesn’t care about Simon at all. They just didn’t talk for a year, probably because Agatha was too embarrassed and because Simon understood Agatha needed her space (I didn’t. I still don’t. I could never leave my friends like that).  
I don’t even know why Agatha came back. Or why she wants to stay. Because she missed us? We had a reasonable amount of fun today, but not enough to make her want to stay. In fact, all we did was bicker today and I'm positively sure she must be very annoyed that everything is about Simon and adventures and mysteries again, not even being back a week.  
‘’Baz tried to protect Simon by insisting he didn’t go to the Mage’’ Agatha says, and she sounds baffled.  
‘’Baz was afraid the Mage would finish him off right there. And he tried to kill the Mage when he attacked Simon. But the Mage was also responsible for his mother’s death so I suppose that probably played a part too.’’ I add.  
‘’The Mage did what?’’ Agatha says, looking up at me again, her face in a frown.  
‘’That’s a whole other story.’’ I say ‘’Let’s drive, Baz’ll probably already be there’’  
‘’Just tell me’’ Agatha says trying to lock eyes with me again.  
I sigh and roll my eyes. ‘’The Watford Tragedy, when the vampires attacked the nursery? Vampires have to be invited before they can go anywhere. It turns out the Mage was the one who invited the vampires to the school grounds, causing headmistress Grimm-Pitch to kill herself and little five year old Baz to get Turned.’’  
‘’Why would the Mage do that?’’  
‘’To expand his power? To get a final push? To secure his position as head of the Coven? As headmaster of Watford? Who knows why the Mage did what the Mage did. That’s why Baz was kidnapped. The Mage knew the Veil would open and needed Baz out of the way so Natasha Grimm-Pitch wouldn’t tell him what happened to her.’’  
‘’Which is why she talked to Simon instead, right?’’ Agatha adds.  
‘’Exactly. She told him about Nicodemus, and that her killer still walked, or something like that, and then she came back and she called Baz her…rosebud…boy…’’ I say slowly.  
Her rosebud boy. Simon talked to Natasha Grimm-Pitch when the Veil opened. Except he told us she came back again later that night. 'He told me we were stars.'  
I still remember everything Simon told me about the Veil opening, because Baz was there and I couldn’t believe he had told Baz before me. Simon had his notebook, and he’d written down everything Natasha had told him, and I reread the page about a million times to make sure I didn’t miss anything, and I didn’t understand why Natasha would come back. Why she would say Simon’s name, when earlier that night it didn’t seem like she knew who Simon was. All she knew was that he wasn’t Baz.  
What if it wasn’t Natasha who came back? What if it was Lucy who came through the Veil to talk to her son? What if it was Lucy trying to get Simon’s attention. Simon. Her rosebud boy.  
‘’We have to go.’’ I say, and I take the keys from Agatha again and cram them in the ignition.


	7. Suave Sherlock Holmes

BAZ

I’m sitting on the curb in front of Wellbelove’s house. Simon’s called me twice, but I didn’t respond. I’m not sure what to tell him yet, and I don’t want to lie to him. Simon is the only person I could never lie to. And right now, it’s either lie, or tell him the truth, and I don’t even know what the truth is.  
I’ve been waiting for nearly 45 minutes when doctor Wellbelove’s Volvo finally pulls up the drive. I stealthily follow the car up the drive and when Bunce and Wellbelove get out, Penelope is frantically looking around, trying to spot me. I slip my hand in my pocket and cough to let her know I’m behind her. They both turn around, and I can tell Agatha is uncomfortable to see me. Let her be. Serves her right. Penelope rolls her eyes at our mutual discomfort and quickly takes a step closer to me. I can tell she’s eager to talk to me about what they found out.  
‘’Well?’’ I say impatiently, lifting an eyebrow.  
‘’Baz, it’s the Mage.’’ Penelope immediately blurts out.  
‘’You think the Mage is Simon’s father?’’, I say and I can’t help but chuckle.  
‘’I know for a fact he’s Simon’s father.’’  
‘’And how is that?’’ I ask her, still laughing.  
‘’Agatha, show him the picture.’’ Penelope says, gesturing at her bag.  
Agatha opens her bag and fumbles around a bit, then takes out her purse and hands me a photograph. I quickly scan the picture. It’s three people sitting on the Great Lawn at Watford. I immediately recognise Penelope’s mother: the resemblance is striking, especially with her hair down like that. I turn the photograph over. Lucy, Davy and I at Watford ’92.  
I turn it over again. There’s also the Mage. It isn’t difficult to recognise him. I’m a Pitch and we’re expected to know everyone and everything in politics. He didn’t change much, except grow that ridiculous moustache. Davy. I've never seen a photograph of the Mage when he was younger. He’s half smiling, I’ve definitely never seen that before, and he has a sheepish look in his eyes. However, I don’t recognise the blonde girl in the middle. Blue eyes, rosy cheeks, head full of curls. She reminds me of Lady Salisbury, which means it’s probably her daughter. That explains why Wellbelove and Bunce were talking to her today, 'skulking around' the club, as my father put it.  
‘’What am I looking at Bunce?’’ I say, lifting my head to look at her.  
‘’Evidence.’’ She says. She seems excited — as if Bunce usually isn’t pedantic and irritating enough, getting her excited is about the last thing you want.  
‘’This picture of your mother and her school friends doesn’t prove anything, Bunce.’’  
‘’Look at that girl in the middle. Who does she remind you of?’’ She asks me eagerly, and she takes another step closer, pointing at the blonde girl. She doesn’t have to ask me twice, I knew it immediately when I looked at the photograph.  
Simon.  
If the resemblance between Penelope and her mother was striking, the resemblance between this woman and Simon is unusually remarkable.  
I give her a sceptical look — because I am sceptical.  
Yes, they share the same bright blue eyes and curls, and Simon even shows some resemblance to Lady Salisbury come to think of it, but this doesn’t prove anything. Magicians don’t give up their children. If the Mage and this Salisbury woman had a child, why would the Mage give him up, then proceed to silently parent him from the age of eleven?  
Penelope rolls her eyes (she does that a lot), and takes another step closer so she can snatch the photograph from my hands. She holds the picture up before my face and points exorbitantly at the Mage and the blonde girl.  
‘’That’s the Mage, and that’s Lucy Salisbury. Mum told me they were dating. And then Agatha told me that one day, Lucy disappeared, perhaps she went to America. But there was apparently a kid involved, according to her mother, Lady Salisbury. This all happened around the late nineties. Then today we found out, Lucy Salisbury is dead. And Lucy came to see Lady Salisbury last year when the Veil opened, and she told her mother that she left something behind and that she wanted her mother to take care of it. But here's the big one: you know what Lady Salisbury called her daughter?" She pauses for dramatic emphasis, and I look at her, both annoyed and intrigued at the same time. "Her little rosebud girl.’’  
My breath catches and my head snaps up, looking away from the photograph to meet her eyes.  
‘’Her what?’’ I snap.  
‘’Rosebud. Girl.’’ Penny repeats.  
I take a step towards the Volvo that’s parked on the drive next to us and let myself lean against it.  
‘’But I thought…’’  
‘’I know. So did I. But Simon said that the woman came back later that night. Maybe it wasn’t your mother coming back. Maybe it was his mother finally managing to come through.’’ Penny says, and she sounds excited again which feels a bit inappropriate. Then again, when I told Simon about his connection to the Humdrum I couldn’t help but feel proud to have cracked the case too.  
"But you just said she went to see her mother as well. How would she have been able to both see her mother and Simon?" "I don't know. I've read about that happening. Someone visiting two people, on different locations, but I've never actually met anyone who has seen it happen. She'd have to have been very powerful. Or very desperate. It must have tired her out a lot. But then again, when she came to see Simon, she was very weak already. He only described hearing her, very faintly." ‘’But magicians don’t give up their children’’ I say, desperately looking for counterarguments.  
If this is true, we’d have to tell Simon both his parents are dead. And that he’s responsible for one of them.  
‘’Lucy is dead, Merlin knows how long, and the Mage… Who knows what that man has done. He’s not a normal magician, he’s been an exception to a lot of other moral rules, why not this one? Plus he didn’t really give Simon up. He’s the one who came to fetch Simon when he was 11 to bring him to Watford.’’  
I know she’s right. Magicians don’t give up their kids, because they don’t want Magic to bleed out through the Normals, but technically the Mage didn’t give Simon up. He just took an eleven year long break from being a parent, and reclaimed Simon when he realised he could prove to be useful. And powerful.  
I face away from Penelope and Agatha and turn to fully lean my back against the Volvo. The thought of the Mage being Simon’s father is revolting, and I shiver as I let myself believe, for the tiniest bit, that it’s true.  
‘’Shit’’ is all I manage to say. My vocabulary has failed me terribly these past few days.  
‘’You can say that again’’, Penelope agrees and she follows my lead and leans against the Volvo. We’re both staring at Agatha’s front garden and none of us say anything.  
I slip a pack of fags out of my jacket, take one out, put it between my lips and light it with my wand. Agatha frowns at me, but Penelope doesn’t even move: she’s used to it by now. I smoke at their flat occasionally. 

It isn’t until I’ve finished my cigarette that I break the silence.  
‘’I’m not convinced yet.’’  
Penelope sighs exasperated, and Agatha looks up from the ground and squints her eyes at me.  
‘’Well, I’m terribly sorry to rain on your parade, Bunce, but we need to calm down first. We should go to my apartment, put all the evidence together, and make sure we didn’t miss anything.’’, I say, and Penelope turns to face me.  
‘’Are you implying I missed something?’’, she says, sounding offended.  
‘’What I’m implying is that we’re getting ahead of ourselves. We need to be absolutely sure before we go over there and possibly send him into another depression.’’  
Penelope is quiet. Agatha is glaring at me and when I look away from Penelope to meet her eyes, she quickly averts her eyes, shifting her weight uncomfortably.  
‘’I’ll take your silence as sign of agreement, so get in the car.’’, I say, holding my hand out in front of Agatha.  
‘’What are you doing?’’ Agatha asks narrowing her eyes at my hand.  
‘’I’m driving’’, I reply casually.  
‘’Why?’’, she asks me, reaching into her bag to fetch her keys.  
‘’Because he’s paranoid about people knowing where he lives. He’s never actually told me either.’’ Penelope says, walking around the car.  
‘’I am not paranoid, Bunce, it’s just difficult to navigate someone else through London.’’  
‘’Less talking, more driving, Baz.’’ Penelope says, and Agatha drops the keys in my hand, then walks past me towards the car. I unlock it, and as I get in and put the keys in the ignition, I try to think of a right way to tell Simon.  
There is no right way to tell Simon.


	8. Let's Start With What We Know

PENELOPE

Baz’ apartment is incredibly tidy. It scares me a bit. There’s barely any sign of him actually living here, but I suppose that’s because he does most of his living at our flat. It was no more than a ten minute drive from Agatha’s house, but with traffic it took us almost half an hour. It’s late, and dark outside, so I couldn’t recognise a lot from where we are, but we’re not far from central London and I think I’d be able to find this place again someday just to tease Baz about finally knowing where he lives.  
The apartment is large and spacious. The floors are dark, hardwood, and the living room is lined with windows with thick curtains draped in front of them. There’s a huge fireplace — which seems ironic — and most of the furniture is made of dark wood too. There’s a tall arched hallway with a few closed doors and I figure that’s where the bathroom and his bedroom must be.The living room is connected to a kitchen with marble counters and a streak of moonlight falls on the kitchen table through a little window above the stove.  
Everything looks expensive, but dated, like someone paid a lot of money for the hard wood, marble counters and expensive furniture a long time ago, but didn’t bother to look after it since.  
I know this place belongs to Baz’ aunt. I wonder if Baz had to do a lot of cleaning to make the apartment liveable, then just decided to give up.  
When we walk into his apartment, Baz walks through the living room into the hallway, disappears into one of the rooms, then comes back carrying a whiteboard about his size.  
‘’Let’s start with what we know’’, I say. 

Agatha is walking around the living room studying every book, photograph and trinket. Baz is eyeing her suspiciously then reverts his attention to me. He hands me a marker and an eraser: we both have one this time. It’s been a long time since we’ve been at this, trying to solve mysteries together.  
He’s a pretty good partner for playing detective. He’s ruthless and stubborn, and he doesn’t give up until he finds out what he needs to know.  
He’s scribbling on the board now, making a family tree.  
Lucy Salisbury, The Mage, Lady Salisbury, Simon.  
I want to add my mother’s name to the list, but she probably isn’t relevant right now.  
Plus, I know that Baz is just doing this to win time. He doesn’t want to tell Simon, because he knows it’ll hurt him. The only reason I’m playing along is because I don’t want to tell Simon either. We’ll have to eventually, but for now we can try to postpone talking to Simon by creating some order in this chaos, even if we know it’s futile.  
‘’Lucy and the Mage were in their final year at Watford in the photograph, that’s 1992. Five years later Simon was born, 1997 — at least, that’s what he thinks. Agatha’s mum told her that Lucy ran away with ‘a man’ — probably the mage — a few years after graduating, so it all lines up.’’ I say.  
Agatha looks up from a picture frame when I mention her name, then gets distracted again by the view from the window. Baz is making a time line.  
‘’Then at 11, The Mage fetches him for Watford, makes him his heir and gives him the sword and the wand…’’ Baz says, adding dates to the timeline.  
‘’Then in our final year, Lucy came through the Veil to talk to Simon and her mother.’’, I say.  
‘’What did Lucy say to Lady Salisbury exactly?’’  
‘’Just that she was very sorry and that she had left something behind that Lady Salisbury needs to take care of. I think Lady Salisbury thought it was an object of some sorts, but wouldn’t it make sense if what she meant was Simon?’’  
Baz nods and writes it on the whiteboard. Veil opened, left something behind that she needed to take care of.  
‘’And of course, Lady Salisbury called Lucy her rosebud girl, and Lucy called Simon her rosebud boy. It makes sense that that’s something Lucy heard from her mother and used as a term of endearment for her own son. Not to mention the resemblance—‘’  
‘’I know, Bunce.’’ Baz growls. He’s not writing anything down, just staring at the whiteboard, clutching the marker in his hand.  
He’s upset. Whenever Baz gets upset, his face goes completely blank. His features harden, and he clenches his jaw. When you pay close attention, you can see he’s sucking on his fangs, but that’s only when he’s thinking about something long and hard.  
He’s doing it now.  
I want to say something, ask him what’s wrong but I know what’s wrong.  
I don’t want to say it, so I don’t say anything and wait for him to speak up.  
Baz’ face is still stone when he takes his eyes from the board to stare out the window. Agatha opened the curtains to watch the cars on the street.  
‘’I’m not sure we should tell Simon about this’’ He finally says.  
There it is.  
He looks over at me, and I take a step forward to stand next to him, facing the board too.  
‘’Baz, we can’t just keep this a secret from him…’’  
‘’I don’t want to either., but we’re not certain about any of this, and the only two people who’d know are dead.’’ Agatha flinches when he says it, but I just nod hazily in agreement.  
‘’You’re right’’ I say absent-mindedly.  
I’m trying to weigh the pros and cons, and I’m positive he is too.  
‘’We can’t drop a bomb like this, Penelope. He’s just starting to get better. Telling him he’s somehow responsible for his father’s death, and that his mother came to visit him when the Veil opened without him even realising… It’s going to break his heart.’’ Baz says looking at me, and his eyes are filled with sorrow.  
Mine are too.


	9. What the Fuck Just Happened to Snow?

BAZ

‘’What is wrong with you? Of course Simon needs to know’’, Agatha says, speaking up for the first time since we came here.  
‘’Agatha’’ Penelope says, annoyed. ‘’Do you ever not want to immediately snitch on us when we discover sensitive information?’’  
‘’I’m not snitching on anyone, okay?’’ Agatha replies, enraged. ‘’This isn’t snitching. This is being a proper, decent human being.’’ She turns to look at me as well as Penelope.  
‘’Just for good measure, I’d like to point out I’m not actually a human being. So I don’t have to worry about being proper or decent.’’, I reply studying my hands. Because I’m too indecent to face her.  
‘’Stop being dramatic, Baz.’’ Penelope snarls. I sneer at her just to take it home.  
Everyone is in a terrible mood. Even Agatha is being refreshingly unpleasant. Or perhaps America has taken its toll on her. Either way, it shouldn’t go unappreciated.  
‘’You need to tell Simon.’’ She says, boldly.  
‘’You?’’ Penelope asks. ‘’Aren’t you coming with us?’’  
Agatha doesn’t reply, just stares at her shoes fumbling with her sleeves.  
‘’I don’t think I should go with you.’’, Agatha finally says.  
‘’Why not?’’ Penelope demands.  
‘’Because it’s not my place, Penny. Because I left Simon behind two years ago, and I came back, and I shouldn’t be out solving mysteries for him again, telling him who his parents are. It just doesn’t fit.’’  
Penelope doesn’t reply. She’s looking at Agatha, a mixture of anger and pity in her eyes.  
For a while, none of us say anything, when suddenly there’s a knock on the door.  
I immediately reach into my pocket and grab my phone: several missed calls from Simon. I appear to have been wrong, my note was definitely suspicious.  
‘’Baz?’’ Simon says through the door now.  
Penelope raises her eyebrows at me, and I can just hear her tell me: didn’t I tell you it’d be suspicious if all three of us disappeared all of the sudden?  
Penelope looks at me nervously, then shrugs like she doesn’t know what to do.  
‘’It’ll break him’’ I tell her in a low voice.  
‘’Then we’ll pick up the pieces.’’ She counters, and I don’t need convincing. I already made up my mind. Agatha is right — who’d have thought the day would come — we need to tell him. I couldn’t even keep a secret like this from Simon if I wanted to. It would tear me apart before the day was over.  
I’m trying to figure out the right way to tell Simon, but I can’t think of anything. Perhaps there isn’t a right way. Perhaps we just have to do it.  
Just do it, and pick up the pieces.  
I walk over to the door and open it, just a tiny bit so he can’t see Penny and Agatha in the living room yet.  
I know this is futile, because knowing Simon, he’ll push the door open as soon as he sees me, barge in and probably destroy a vase on the way in.  
(Fiona used to have a large vase in the hallway. She hated it, but still, she kept it because she said it gave the hallway a sophisticated vibe. I told her that being a Pitch was sophisticated enough, and that using the word vibe is really counterproductive if she is trying to be sophisticated. Then she threatened to take back her keys so I apologised.) (I say Fiona used to have a vase because the first time Simon came over to look at my apartment, he knocked over the vase and later spilled tea all over the sofa, and he’s been afraid to set foot in here ever since.)  
He’s squinting his eyes at me now, suspiciously. Because this is suspicious. My leaving was suspicious too, so I can’t blame him.  
‘’Baz?’  
I immediately hear it in his voice. He’s still sad, the way he was before he left, but now there’s a mixture of nervousness and insecurity in his voice.  
Without saying anything, I hold the door open further so he can see Penny and Agatha, and the large whiteboard in the living room.  
‘’What are you doing?’’, Simon says, walking right past me towards them, ‘’What are you doing here?’’  
‘’There’s something we need to tell you, Simon’’, I say. (clichéd)  
‘’It’s about your parents’’ Penelope says, walking towards him.  
‘’Why don’t you sit down, love.’’ I tell him. Agatha gives me a strange look and I ignore it.  
‘’Why do people always ask you to sit down when they have bad news? I’ll stand, thank you very much.’’ Simon says defensively. He feels threatened, I can tell, probably because we all went behind his back and blatantly lied to him, and I feel bad for doing so.  
I don’t like lying to Simon. I never, ever lie to Simon.  
‘’Look, Simon, we think we might know who your parents are.’’ Penelope says. Simon looks at her with big eyes. ‘’Or were…’’ she adds.  
Simon turns around to look at me, and he looks frantic.  
‘’Baz?’’  
I walk towards him and sit him down in an armchair, then take a seat on the couch myself.  
‘’Penelope and Agatha told me this afternoon. It all seems to make sense, though we can’t—‘’  
\- ‘’Who are they?’’ He says forcefully, eyes flashing back and forth from me to Penelope.  
Neither of us say anything and for a while we just look at each other, waiting for the other to speak up, or finding the words to say it ourselves.  
‘’Well?’’ Simon demands.  
‘’We think it might have been a woman named Lucy Salisbury…’’ Penelope finally concedes.  
‘’And, well, there’s no easy way to say this…the Mage.’’ I add.  
Simon looks absolutely stunned. He stares at me, then at Penelope, and then he stares at the floor, clenching his hands. His nostrils flare and he’s biting his lip, and he runs a hand through his curls, because he’s confused, or frustrated, or lost. I want to do something. Comfort him, hold his hand, just be near him, but he looks so closed off, so hostile, the way he looked back at Watford. And I know it’s because us three being here together, telling him this is incredibly overwhelming. I know it’s because he must be extremely conflicted about what he believes. What he wants to believe.  
‘’That can’t be true. That’s…that’s insane.’’ he says, bewildered.  
Penelope squats down in front of him and puts a hand on his knee.  
‘’The Mage, or Davy, used to date this girl, you see, at Watford, called Lucy. They ran off together a few years after Watford, and it’s said there may have been a child involved—‘’  
‘’That’s insane, Penelope.’’ Simon growls at her. ‘’It can’t be true.’’  
I close my eyes because I genuinely want him to be right. I genuinely want it not to be true. But however much I want to resist believing it, it makes sense. There’s plenty of evidence to support it, plus, intuitively, it makes sense. Seeing that woman in that photograph, it was like looking at Simon himself. I can’t imagine Agatha didn’t think of it, carrying that picture around for over a year.  
Though she is astonishingly unobservant.  
Simon is still looking at the floor, and Penelope is desperately trying to make eye contact.  
‘’When the Veil opened, Simon… We think she may have come to see you. We think it might have been her calling you her rosebud boy. Not my mother.’’ I say, studying him from the couch. I feel weak not being able to go to him, to pull him close and comfort him.   
‘’I don’t understand. Who is this woman? Why would she—‘’ Simon says, his voice shaking, though I can tell he’s forcing back his tears.  
‘’We went to talk to her mother, Lady Salisbury, Agatha knows her from the club. She told us about Lucy, and how Lucy came through the Veil to speak to her, and asked her to take care of something. We think Lucy might have been talking about you, Simon.’’ Penelope says, stroking his knee.  
‘’Is that what all that was today? You were going behind my back, keeping my parents a secret from me to go interrogate some old lady?’’ Simon says, standing up, roughly shaking off Penelope’s hand.  
Penelope immediately stands too.  
‘’We didn’t mean to keep it a secret from you, Simon. I only had a suspicion, and no actual proof. We wanted to know for certain before we dropped a bomb like this on you.’’  
"That's what this is about? When will you two stop worrying about me and stop talking about me behind my back?" Penny and I lock eyes, just for a second, then look back at Simon. "That's right. Don't think I don't hear you two whispering about me being depressed, every time I so much as decide to skip class so I can sleep in just once." "We were just worried about you, Simon." Penny says soothingly. "We knew you finding out about this would be-" ‘’It’s a lie, Penelope.’’ Simons growls at her. ‘’The mage can’t be my father. Why would he just— I don’t— It doesn’t make sense. What did I do? Why would he give me up and…And then come find me again, and never tell me?’’  
‘’It’s nothing you did, Simon.’’ I try to soothe him.  
‘’Then what is it, Baz? Why was he hiding in plain sight for all those years? Why didn’t he ever tell me about this Lucy woman? How could my own mother come visit me through the Veil, without me even being aware of it? It can’t be true. Any of it, it doesn’t make sense.’’  
Agatha fishes the photograph out of her purse and hands it to Simon.  
‘’Lady Salisbury called her, her rosebud girl…’’ she mutters.  
Simon takes the photograph and looks at it, floored.  
Then he takes his eyes off of it to look at us and starts blustering.  
All of the sudden I feel something coming from inside of him, something that I haven’t felt in a very long time.  
Heat. Radiance.  
Not the dangerous kind that he used to emit, but definitely not the normal kind either.  
The very, very not Normal, magickal kind. It isn’t overflowing, or filling the air with static, like it used to, but it’s filling his aura, slightly beaming under his skin. He looks more alive, more like he used to at Watford. He looks like he’s magic. Which is impossible. We all know it’s impossible.  
Simon’s face is filled with complete confusion and a hint of fear, as he lifts his hands and studies them, then looks up at us with big eyes, frantically looking for some sort of explanation from either of us.  
But Penelope and I are as stunned as he is. This isn’t possible. He isn’t supposed to have any magic left in him, this can’t be happening.  
Then Simon legs it, out of the apartment, the photograph still in his hands, slamming the door behind him.  
I look over at Agatha, then at Penelope.  
‘’What the fuck just happened to Snow?’’


	10. Rock-a-bye Baby

SIMON

It can’t be real. It can’t be real. I’m just imagining it.   
I run down the stairs, yank the door open and run out on the street.   
It can’t be real. It isn’t real.   
I can feel it though. I can feel it rushing through my veins. I can feel it at the tip of my fingers, right underneath my skin.   
‘’Simon?’’  
I lift my hands to study them. They look normal.   
I look at my palms. There are three long lines stretching across each of them, but those have been there my entire life. They’re normal. They’re palm lines. My magic isn’t pouring out of them, there’s no static hanging around me, everything looks normal.  
‘’Simon.’’  
So it can’t be real. I must be imagining it.   
Except I’m not imagining it. Something’s different. Or, the same. Something feels different, but familiar, and that scares the living hell out of me.  
I start running again. I don’t know where to, I just have to get away from Baz and Penny and Agatha before I do something stupid. Before I go off. Could I go off? It doesn’t feel like I’m about to go off, but I haven’t felt like that in a long time. Would I even recognise it?  
‘’Simon!’’  
I keep running. It can’t be real. It can’t have come back, where would it have been for the past two years?  
Magic doesn’t just disappear and grow back.   
I know that because my psychologist told me so.  
‘’At some point, Simon’’, she said, ‘’you have to accept that it’s gone. It’s gone and it won’t come back. You can’t keep latching onto the past, it’s tearing you apart.’’  
At first she never gave me such direct advice. At first, all she did was ask me questions. Ask me to interpret my feelings, ask me to analyse my behaviour, ask me to try and figure myself out, by myself.   
And I did. It was a rocky road, and it took me a long time to get better, but eventually I did. Because eventually, after she told me to let go, I did.   
‘’Simon, please!’’  
Magic doesn’t just grow back. It’s gone. And it won’t come back.   
So why is my mind playing such a cruel trick on me?   
Am I having a nightmare?   
I must be having a nightmare.   
If I’m having a nightmare, I must be able to do impossible things.   
Like flying.   
Maybe, if I keep running fast enough, my wings will stretch out, and I’ll be able to fly. And if I fly, then I’ll know for sure that it’s a nightmare, because I’ve tried to fly with my wings before, but I couldn’t do it, and Penny told me that without magic, it’s no use.   
Maybe I should take my jacket off. To give my wings the chance to spread.   
Then again, if it’s a dream, I shouldn’t have to worry about logic.   
And it definitely is. A dream. Because it can’t be real. The magic rushing through my veins is a dream.   
I feel so alive. But it’s a dream.   
I pick up the pace. I have to run as fast as I can if I want to fly. There are cars on the street, flashing by me, honking their horns, but I know it’s not real.   
‘’Simon, look out!’’  
I stop running and turn around, and I see Baz and Penny running towards me, Agatha not far behind them.   
There’s a bright light on my right, and I think I must be waking up.   
The light is coming towards me at full speed, and I’m standing in the middle of the road, and though it tries to slow down, it’s too late. I put my arms over my head, close my eyes and drop to the ground, waiting for the car to hit me.   
Except it doesn’t.   
I open one eye and look up. The car is stopped in front of me. Baz is on his knees next to me, both hands on the hood of the car. I open my other eye and see there’s a huge dent in the car where Baz is touching it.   
I must have gone off. I look at the sky, and I swear I feel that itching feeling. That sucking feeling. The kind the humdrum created. The kind I created.   
Baz turns around and he’s saying something, but I have to tell him to run, because the humdrum is here. Because I went off, and I made him come back. Because I’m creating holes again, and I can’t protect Baz.   
I can never protect Baz. He has to run.   
‘’Rock-a-bye, baby, in the tree top. When the wind blows, the cradle will rock. When the bough breaks the cradle will fall. Down will come baby, cradle and all’’  
I turn around and see Penny standing in front of me, her palm over my head, and when I try to open my mouth to tell her to run, my eyelids start getting heavy, and I can’t help but yawn. I open my eyes to look up at Penny, and she’s smiling down at me reassuringly.   
‘’Baby is drowsing, cosy and fair. Mother sits near in her rocking chair. Forward and back, the cradle she swings. Though baby sleeps, he hears what she sings’’  
Baz has turned away from the car and he’s facing me too. He cups my cheek with his hand, and when I look at his other hand, he’s holding a wand and he’s pointing it at me. Then I close my eyes again, and Baz takes his hand off my cheek and places it on my knee.   
‘’Rock-a-bye baby, do not you fear. Never mind, baby, mother is near. Wee little fingers, eyes are shut tight. Now sound asleep - until morning light’’  
They’re both singing to me, sweetly and softly. I open my eyes one last time, and all I see is Baz and Penelope, the rest of the world looks misty and bleak.   
Then I close my eyes and fall asleep.


	11. Do You Still Have Your Wand?

SIMON

"I don't know what to tell you.’’  
Someone’s pacing the room, and I recognise the deliberate and gentle treads like they’re my own.  
It’s Baz. He’s pacing the room, and he’s talking to someone, but his rhythm is off. He takes a step, then he skips a beat and his next tread sounds heavy and clumsy.  
Is he limping?  
‘’Perhaps you should sit down, Basilton.’’  
‘’I’m fine.’’  
‘’Your knee —‘’  
‘’I assure you: I’m fine. Please continue.’’  
The other person sighs, then continues: ‘’As I was saying: this is highly unusual. We're going to have to run some tests. Professor Bunce is on his way to take a look himself."  
"What? How many people have you told about this, exactly?"  
“Just the people who needed to know. Stop worrying, Basilton. It'll be all right." I hear the other person say. And then I hear him take a call and walk out of the room while saying: ‘yes’ every now and then.  
I think it’s Agatha’s dad, but I’m not completely sure. I haven’t talked to him in years, plus: why would he be in my flat? Where am I exactly?  
I open my eyes and immediately close them again because the light coming through the windows is so bright, it’s blinding me. I try to say something, but my mouth is dry and my throat is sore, so all I’m able to get out is a weak moan. I hear someone's footsteps coming towards me.  
"Curtains" I manage to choke out.  
Then I hear someone stepping away from me and closing the blinds.  
I slowly open my eyes to let them adjust to the light.  
I'm in a large, spacious living room.  
It's Agatha's living room.  
I'm on her couch, with several blankets wrapped around me. Agatha has a modern living room, with large windows along the walls, but the curtains are down now and a single streak of light falls across the floor, right next to where Baz is standing, on the other side of the room, his hands in his pockets, staring at me.  
We lock eyes and I can tell he's worried. His face looks blank, but if you look closely, he’s sucking on his fangs, which he only does when he’s worried, or thinking about something very hard. Maybe he’s doing both. He's wearing black trousers, snug around his legs and waist, and a green jumper. My favourite jumper. I wonder if he wore it on purpose because he knows I like it.  
He's not wearing jeans. Wasn't he wearing jeans before?  
How long have I been here?  
"How do you feel?" Baz asks, still not moving from his spot near the window.  
I keep looking at him because I'm not sure what he's talking about.  
I don't remember anything. I just remember a really strange dream.  
"Why am I on Agatha's couch?” I ask with some difficulty — my throat is really dry — pulling myself up slightly so I’m sitting up.  
Baz walks over to me, pulls a chair with him, then sits down across from me.  
"What do you remember, Simon?”  
"What do you mean? What happened?"  
Baz crosses his legs and rubs his face with his right hand.  
"Just tell me what you remember"  
"I remember being with you, going out to get fish and chips… Coming home to find you weren't there…. Then I tried calling you but you didn't answer and… then I... I don't remember. I think— I mean — I know..."  
Baz cuts me off with a hand.  
“—Simon, I'm going to tell you what happened, but you need to tell me if you start to feel scared or anxious. Understand?” Baz says giving me a firm look.  
I look at Baz' hands, and there's bandage wrapped around both his wrists. I don’t know how far up it goes, because he’s pulled his sleeves down as far as possible, but something must have happened to his arms.  
I must have done something to his arms.  
When Baz sees me eyeing his hands, he immediately pulls them back, slipping them back in his pockets.  
"Baz, you're injured"  
"I'm fine, Snow."  
"Did I do that? What happened last night?”  
I can feel my throat closing up, so I take a deep breath, but it feels like nothing’s coming in or out. It feels like my chest is this big black hole, sucking everything up without feeling satisfied.  
"I need you to calm down, Snow."  
"I hurt you. Where's Penny? What did I do?"  
I try to choke back my tears, but they start pouring out, and when I try to breathe in, there’s still no air around me.  
Baz gets up, and sits down next to me on the couch.  
“Ssh… it's all right, Simon. Take it easy. Deep breaths, okay?’’ Baz whispers soothingly, one hand on my back, the other stroking my hair, trying to calm me down.  
I close my eyes and tears keep falling over my face, while I breathe in and out, frantically, like I’ve lost all control.  
Because I have.  
And that’s the worst part about panic attacks. One part of your brain has lost all ability to function, and all it can do is freak out and imagine things or fear things, while the other part of the brain is fully aware of the fact that it’s not functioning the way it’s supposed to, but it still can’t do anything to seize control, which only makes you feel like a bigger idiot.  
‘’Just focus on your breath now. In and out. Nothing else, okay? Just like we agreed, remember?’’  
I feel like a perfect idiot. What sort of a messed up human being can’t even control their own breathing?  
It’s a basic human function. I can’t even take care of myself.  
If I can’t even take care of myself, how am I supposed to take care of Baz? Or Penny?  
Why do they even stay with me?  
I wouldn’t.  
‘’Clear your mind, Simon. Promise? Promise me just to focus on breathing, and on my voice, nothing else. Breathe in. Hold it. Breathe out.’’  
Breathe in.  
Hold it.  
Breathe out.  
How am I supposed to protect Baz, when I can’t even—  
—Breathe in.  
Hold it.  
Breathe out.  
‘’I'm here, Simon, don't worry.” Baz says, wiping the tears off my cheeks, and cupping my face with his hands ‘’I'm all right. Everyone's all right.’’

BAZ

It took a while for him to calm down, and when he did, I got up to get him a cup of tea.  
Penelope isn't back yet. She should be here any minute. 

After Penelope and I spelled Simon to sleep — using a nursery rhyme; we were both completely knackered after using that much magic — Penelope left to get her parents, while Agatha and I tried to get back to the car to take Simon to her father. Which wasn’t easy.  
When I tried to stop the car from hitting Simon, I ran over to him, — at a speed I’m usually only able to achieve when I’m hunting, or really, really terrified — planted my knee on the ground and pushed the car back with everything I had. Causing both my arms to do— well to do something. Something bad. So when Agatha and I tried to get Simon back to the car, I was no help, because I could barely move myself.  
Then, when we got to Doctor Wellbelove, he patched me up as well as he could, then shut the door in my face to take a look at Simon.  
Simon definitely needed the attention more than I did. I may have bruised my wrists, or fucked up my knee, but Simon grew magic.  
It took Simon a good part of two years to get over the fact that he’d lost his magic. I think he was just coming to terms with it too, after his psychologist told him that he needed to accept it in order to move on with his life.  
Maybe his magic had been there all these years, just waiting, growing stronger.  
Maybe Penelope’s father was right. He said that magic could grow back in the dead spots — and it did — just like how vegetation grew back in Chernobyl when nobody thought it was possible.  
Nobody thought it was possible that Simon’s magic might grow back, yet here we are.  


I walk back into the living room holding a tray with two steaming cups of tea on top of it — I actually put on a kettle because I’m still too tired to use magic — and a plate of cheese sandwiches that Agatha’s mum made for Simon. Simon is stood up, folding his blankets. (We put three on top of him because we were terrified that he’d be cold and wouldn’t be able to wake up because we spelled him asleep, and we didn’t want him to catch a cold) (That nursery rhyme was way stronger than we thought it would be)  
He looks up when I walk into the room (or should I say falter into the room), then he takes a look at my leg and frowns at me. He immediately takes the tray from me and points to the couch. I sit down as he looks pointedly at my leg.  
‘’Why are you limping?’’ He asks, taking a seat next to me and putting his cup down on the coffee table.  
‘’Do you still have your wand?’’ I ask.  
He narrows his eyes at me.  
‘’Why?’’ He asks suspiciously and he runs his hand through his hair, like he always does when he’s anxious.  
‘’Just answer me, Snow’’ I say impatiently.  
‘’Yes. I kept it.’’  
I nod thoughtfully and he looks down at the floor like he feels guilty.  
‘’I know I wasn’t supposed to—‘’  
‘’—Where is it?’’  
’’It’s in my nightstand. Why are you asking all this?’’  
I take my phone out of my pocket and try to text Penelope (I say try because my hands hurt like hell) telling her to stop by the flat on her way here to pick up his wand.  
When I don’t answer he nudges my shoulder and looks up at me expectantly.  
‘’Answer me. How long have I been here? What happened to your arms?’’  
I study my wrists. They hurt. Doctor Wellbelove ordered me to rest, to try to avoid straining my wrists. I should really stop making my injuries worse. I turn to face him.  
‘’Simon you’ve been here for… a couple of days’’  
‘’What?’’  
‘’You’ve been asleep, for about three days. That’s why I brought you these sandwiches, you should really eat something.’’ I say, nudging my head at the tray.  
Simon doesn’t say anything, but his eyes are big and I can tell he’s trying to remember what happened, but he can’t. I know for a fact that he can’t because that’s what happens when you cast a sleeping spell on someone. Usually they can’t remember the moment the spell was cast, but a nursery rhyme — and quite a strong one I might add — takes more than just a moment. It takes hours.  
‘’Simon, a few nights back you came to my apartment and you found me, Penelope and Agatha in my living room, do you remember?’’  
He squints his eyes and he nods, so I assume he stills remembers bits of it.  
‘’We told you something. About your parents. We know who they are, do you remember that?’’  
‘’The mage’’ He utters, and I nod my head affirmatively and look at him with big eyes. I need to make sure he doesn't freak out about this again, before I tell him the other thing - which might cause him to freak out some more.  
‘’That’s one part of the story. There’s more, but we need to talk about this first. Because it’s pretty big news, and you must be feeling a lot about this.’’  
‘’Just… keep going.’’ He says, staring at the floor, fumbling with his sleeves.  
I sigh, but continue, because he wants me to and I understand why.  
‘’When we told you, you didn’t want to believe it, and you got very agitated, so much so that… something happened to you. I can’t really explain what, but it definitely wasn’t Normal.’’  
His head jerks to me. ‘’Not Normal?’’  
‘’Not normal, as in: magickal.’’  
He takes a deep breath through his nose, and I grab his hand and squeeze it, and he clenches it, because he knows that he’s supposed to. Sometimes this works. Sometimes when he can feel it coming, the anxiety, I’ll grab his hand and he’ll clench it as hard as he can to try to take back control. This time, he clenches it, and I yelp and yank my hand back, because I forgot that I bruised my stupid wrists.  
Simon immediately looks over at me, terrified, and apologises.  
I shush him and shove a pillow in his lap.  
‘’I’m okay, just squeeze this okay? I’m all right, I promise, it doesn’t even hurt.’’  
That’s a lie.  
I never, ever lie to Simon except when he’s having an anxiety attack. Or when he’s drunk and he throws up in the bathroom and he feels guilty about me having to clean it up. Then I tell him that it’s my vomit because I threw up too, and he always feels better.  
The poor idiot never finds it strange that whenever he throws up, I throw up too.  
He squeezes the pillow and I stroke his hair and give him some time to calm down.  
He nods his head and tells me to go on, so I do.  
‘’You felt your magic, and you lost it, so you ran out on the streets and when we told you to stop running, you stopped in the middle of the street and almost got hit by a car… ’’  
"Almost?" "Yes. Almost." "What do you mean, almost? It stopped?" "I stopped it." ‘’You stopped a car?’’  
‘’It wasn’t going that fast.’’  
‘’Is that why you’re injured? Because you had to protect me from a moving vehicle?’’  
‘’I tried to move you, but it’s like you were stuck to the ground; you wouldn’t move. So I turned and put my arms on the hood of the car, and pushed.’’  
‘’And then you broke your arms and legs.’’  
‘’I just bruised my wrists, and my right knee is a little beat up. Honestly, I’m fine.’’  
‘’I’m so sorry, Baz. I’m so sorry, this shouldn’t have happened. I’m so so—‘’  
‘’Don’t be. Simon, look at me.’’ I say, and I take his chin and pull his face towards mine, pushing my lips onto his. Then I pull back and look him in the eyes. ‘’I’m fine. See? I’m fine, and you didn’t hurt me. You didn’t. The bloody car did.’’  
Simon looks down at his lap.  
‘’I love you, Simon. I love you so fucking much, I couldn’t breathe, so I did something stupid and I hurt myself. Please, never do that again. You could have killed yourself, and I wouldn’t know what to do if that happened.’’  
Simon nods and then looks up at me, a puzzled look on his face.  
‘’Why was I asleep for several days, if I didn’t get hurt?’’  
‘’Penelope and I spelled you asleep to keep you safe.’’  
‘’You spelled me asleep for several days? How did you do that?’’  
‘’We cast a ‘’Rock-a-bye Baby’’.’’  
‘’You cast a nursery rhyme on me? I can’t believe it worked.’’  
‘’Well Bunce is a mighty force to be reckoned with, and then of course, there's me.’’  
Simon chuckles, but I can tell his mind is somewhere else completely. The magic, his parents. I don’t know what he’s feeling right now, but it must be overwhelming.  
‘’To be honest, the spell was so draining I haven’t been able to so much as light a fire in my hand, for the past few days, let alone use actual magic.’’  
Simon grins up at me, then his face falls again, and I can see his eyes flash from one end of the room to the other.  
When the doorbell rings, Simon’s head jerks up, and he looks up at me questioningly.  
I get up, he follows, and before I walk (limp) out of the room, I turn around to face him and grab his hand.  
‘’We’re going to try something now, and it might be difficult for you, so first I need to know if you’re okay. If you’re not, we won’t do it. But you have to tell me, you have to be honest, all right? Do you promise?’’  
He looks scared, and worried and confused, but he nods and I do too, and I kiss him just one more time because I can, because I haven’t been able to for three days.  
Then I walk to the front door to let Bunce in.  
What we’re about to do might change everything.


	12. Did I Do That?

PENELOPE

Baz opens the door, and there’s Simon, standing right behind him with big, red eyes, shoulders dropped. I walk right past Baz and pull Simon into a tight hug. As always, his wings get in the way, but I don’t care. I need him close to me. I need to make sure he’s alive. And then I need to make sure he’s going to stay alive.  
‘’Good to see you too, Bunce’’ Baz sneers, but I know he means it, because I can see his shoulders and arms relax a little, and maybe even a faint smile on his face. Then he turns to look at the door again, and the smile immediately fades away.  
‘’What’s this?’’  
Dad walks in and rudely pushes me aside to take a look at Simon, leaving Micah on the doorstep, shifting his weight.  
‘’How are you feeling, Simon? Same as before?’’ Dad asks Simon inquisitively, studying him with curious eyes, the way he always looks when he’s working.  
‘’Dad, maybe we can have a cup of tea first? Let him rest a little?’’  
‘’Micah?’’ Baz says.  
‘’Hi’’ Micah says, an awkward smile on his face.  
Simon looks over Dad’s shoulder to watch him, and Baz takes a step back, gesturing for him to come in.  
‘’Sorry we’re so late’’ I say ‘’I told Micah what happened, and he insisted on flying over to try and help’’  
‘’I worked on the holes in the UK with Professor Bunce for a while, so I figured I might be of some use. How are you feeling, Simon?’’ Micah asks, taking a step closer to Simon.  
Simon looks a bit dazed, and he takes a quick look at Micah, dad and me, before answering: ‘’I’m good, how are you?’’  
Micah chuckles and pushes his glasses up a bit. ‘’The guy almost gets hit by a car, then asks me how I’m doing. Amazing.’’  
‘’Well, enough chit-chat. Let’s get to it.’’  
‘’Dad’’ I sigh. ‘’He just woke up. We can’t just barge in here and experiment on him like he’s a guinea pig’’  
‘’What experiments?’’ Simon asks.  
I take his wand out of my jacket and hand it to Baz, so I can take my jacket off and hang it on the coat rack. Dad and Micah follow, and Baz leads us to the living room, studying the wand tentatively. He’s probably wondering if it’ll work for Simon now, since it never has before.  
I’ve been wondering the same, ever since he asked me to pick it up from the apartment. Everything is new now. My dad wasn’t sure how to proceed either. He thinks we should just give Simon the wand, and try out some simple spells. I asked him if it wasn’t dangerous. If we wouldn’t risk creating a new hole, but he said we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it. 

And so here we are, about to cross that bridge, Simon and Baz on the couch, Micah and I on two arm chairs next to them, and Dad, stood up next to the window staring at Simon, trying to figure him out.  
‘’Well’’ Dad says, frowning ‘’Give him the wand, then’’  
Baz locks eyes with him. He looks concerned. Then dad gives him a reassuring look and gestures for him to hand the wand over to Simon, so he does. Simon takes it, and looks around the room with an agitated look on his face.  
‘’It’s not going to work’’ Simon says.  
‘’How are you so sure?’’ I ask him.  
He turns to face me and opens his mouth to say something, then closes it again. He’s nervously shaking his leg so I can tell he’s feeling anxious again, which I can imagine. Here we are, stood around him in the living room, watching his every move like he’s a rat in a cage.  
‘’Look, I don’t know what you saw — or think you saw — but — it won’t work. I just know that it won’t work. Magic doesn’t work that way.’’  
He’s blustering again, his leg still shaking aggressively. Baz scoots closer to him and puts one hand on his knee and the other on his back. Simon closes his eyes and Baz whispers some soothing words into his ear, which I can barely make out.  
‘’Breathe in…right here next to you, Simon…always right here next to you…we can stop if you don’t want this…just say the word…Breathe in…breathe out’’  
Simon nods his head then opens his eyes again.  
It must be obvious that I’m worried, because Micah softly places a hand on my back and strokes it, very subtly, to calm me down.  
‘’Simon, for all we know, you’re right. Maybe it won’t work. But it’s worth a try. If you’re up for it, that is.’’  
Dad says. He’s worried too. But excited, and curious. I can tell he wants Simon to try it out because if there’s one thing my dad can’t stand, it’s not knowing something. And it’s obvious that something’s different with Simon. He looks a bit more…alive. That’s the way Dr. Wellbelove described it, Baz told me over the phone.  
It’s true. I look at Simon now — he’s gingerly staring at his wand — and he looks fuller. A bit bolder, a bit more sparkly. More alive.  
When we were at Watford, Simon was so alive, that even his magic felt like it’s own entity. Like something that could lash out at any moment, and run it’s own course. Simon was so alive, it was like he wasn’t just one being, it’s like he was everything at once. And that’s what drew most people to him, including me.  
Then, when he lost his magic, all of that was gone. The wings and tail took away everything Normal about him, but even if he hadn’t had those, there was something else, something about his skin, about his body, that was different, even from the Normals. It had lost its glow, its liveliness. It wasn’t even like the way Baz’ skin looks, which is a bit dimmer than when he was little — Simon showed me a picture once, and when Baz found out, he was seriously ticked off for a few days — Simon looked like he was an unnourished child, seriously lacking some vitamin D. Everyday he’d wake up and look like he hadn’t eaten in days.  
At first, Baz and I didn’t say anything, not even to each other, because we thought it might sort itself out. Perhaps Simon really had been letting himself go a little, but surely if he got some order back into his life, he’d get a bit healthier.  
That never happened. Baz and I tried talking about it, but we didn’t really like to, because neither of us could explain it, so it was futile. All we could do is watch him, asleep on the couch, or in the kitchen making dinner, singing songs. All we could do is briefly exchange a worried look, then continue like nothing was wrong. And apparently, he noticed.  
Perhaps after a while, we really believed nothing was wrong.  
‘’If this is what it takes to convince you nothing’s changed, then fine.’’ Simon says now, standing up and looking at my dad expectantly.  
His face immediately lights up, and he gestures for Simon to come stand next to him so he’ll have a bit more space. Simon walks over to him, and dad takes him by the shoulders and places him in front of the coffee table. He takes a deck of cards out of his pocket, takes out one playing card - the Jack of Hearts - and places it on the table, then takes a few steps back so he’s behind Simon again.  
‘’Let’s start with something simple.’’ Dad says ‘’Try Up, up and away-ing that card.’’  
Baz stands too and limps across the room to stand a few steps behind Simon. He really shouldn’t be walking on that leg. I get up and stand next to dad, and Micah follows, completing the semi-circle around Simon.  
Simon grasps his wand firmly and holds it out in front of him, staring at the card on the table. Baz’ face is blank, so I can’t tell what he’s thinking, but he’s staring at Simon, so I imagine he must be worried. Baz and I lock eyes for a split second, exchanging all our worries about Simon, then we both look away, turning our attention to Simon and the small playing card on the table, facing up. Dad and Micah look eager and puzzled, Micah standing with his arms crossed, and my dad holding a notepad and a pen, ready to document whatever happens next.  
Simon focusses on the card, one hand holding his wand out in front of him, the other hanging loose next to his body, fingers clenched up in a fist. He's hesitating. It's like he's playing golf and he's doing a few practice swings in order to make sure he hits it the right way. But I can tell he's insecure. His hand is shaking. He's sweating. And he's whispering something, very softly, as if he's practicing the spell before actually saying it. Then he runs his hand through his hair, inhales deeply and says, with as much force as he can: ‘’Up, up and away!’’  
We all stare at the card, waiting for it to fly up, reach the ceiling, or get thrown across the room.  
Nothing happens.  
It doesn’t even flinch.  
Simon throws his hands up, and turns around lividly, handing the wand back to Baz.  
‘’See? I told you. Nothing’s changed.’’  
‘’Now wait just one second, Simon. You didn’t really expect this to work on the first try, did you?’’ Dad says, and Baz nods thoughtfully, handing the wand back to Simon. He doesn’t take it.  
‘’Crowley, what does it take to convince you people that I’m right?’’  
‘’Just try again’’ Dad urges him, and this time, Simon doesn’t protest. He rolls his eyes, snatches the wand from Baz, points it at the card, and firmly says: ‘’Up, up and away!’’  
The card jumps up, then immediately falls down again.  
Simon drops his arm and stares at the Jack of Hearts.  
None of us say anything.  
I truly didn’t expect for it to work. I don’t think any of us did, not even dad. I think he really, really, wanted it to work, but didn’t truly believe it would. I know for a fact Micah didn’t think it’d work, because we talked about it as soon as he landed.  
And Baz… I never know what Baz thinks, or believes, or wants. I can only guess. Right now, he’s staring at Simon, but he doesn’t look shocked or surprised. His face is blank and he’s sucking on his fangs, his eyes narrowed, staring at the back of Simon’s head.  
Simon turns around, drops his wand and stares at the floor, then looks up at us with big eyes.  
‘’Did I do that?’’


	13. He Was All I Had

BAZ

Simon and I are sprawled out on my bed, our heads on my pillow, just an inch of space between our hands.  
We barely spoke in the car ride home. Simon barely said a word at all since he lifted that feather.  
We tried some more spells after that. ''Some Like it Hot'', ''Make a Wish''.  
Sometimes they'd work, but more often than not, nothing happened, and occasionally someone would have to jump in and cast the spell before it got out of hand. To practise ''Make a Wish'', we went into Agatha's backyard and set something on fire, and if Micah hadn't been on standby to swoop in, it could have spread. When we started the fire, it freaked Simon right out. He insisted I go inside and watch through the window, even though I was the one who lit the flame in my hand. When I refused, he told me to stand behind him. I did, he already looked so let down that his magic wasn't working, I couldn't put up a fight with him too.  
I could tell Simon was disappointed. He started looking more beat down the longer we kept going, so eventually I said I was tired and that we should try again some other time. Professor Bunce gave us a ride to my apartment. 

We got home, fell onto my bed, and we've both been staring at the ceiling since.  
I like this about Simon. Sometimes we don't have to say anything. We can just be near each other, and take comfort in the fact that the other is there.  
Sometimes we're both in the same room, without saying a single word to each other, but it makes me feel so safe, just knowing he's there. It doesn't matter what we're doing, I just like having him near me. Where I can keep an eye on him. And he's probably keeping an eye on me.  
And so we stare at the ceiling, in silence. And after some time I consider asking him how he is, but he doesn't look like he's ready to talk yet. So I rest my hand upon his, but he doesn't even flinch, he doesn't respond at all, he just keeps staring at the cracks in my ceiling, absent-mindedly fiddling with the sleeve of his shirt.  
''You should sleep''  
He nods.  
I lift his hand to my lips and place a soft kiss on it, then I get up to take my shoes off and turn the lights off in the living room.  
When I get back, Simon's under the covers, his clothes and shoes on the floor. When I look closer, his eyes are wide open, and he's still staring at the ceiling.  
''Is it bad again?'' I ask.  
''No'' He answers.  
''What are you thinking, Simon?''  
He doesn't say anything, but after a while he sits up and says: ''Turn the lights on''  
I do. Then I walk over to the bed and sit next to him, and he immediately wraps my arm around him, nestling into my chest.  
''Simon?'' I ask again. ''What's going through your head?''  
''My mind is blank, Baz.''  
''It never is.''  
He sighs.  
''Are you disappointed?''  
''No.''  
''Then what are you, tell me.''  
''I don't know.''  
''Try to know.''  
This is our routine. When it gets bad, we try to slow it down a bit, talk it through together. Most of the time, Simon doesn't even know what he's feeling to begin with, and that uncertainty unleashes all of this angst and anxiety and terror within him, causing him to get a panic attack.  
''This just...Isn't how it was supposed to go'' He says. ''How it was supposed to go?'' I ask, confused.  
''We were supposed to be done. I've had more adventure in five years than anyone has in a lifetime.''  
I chuckle. ''I suppose life doesn't work like that. It doesn't look at what you've been through now and decide what's fair. It just happens.''  
''I wish it didn't happen.''  
We're quiet for a while, and I'm trying to figure out what to say next without pushing the wrong buttons. ''Do you wish you'd never found out who your parents were?''  
He's quiet. It was bold of me to ask him this, but we had to talk about it at some point. It had become this heavy unnamed thing, hanging above us like a dark cloud in a rainstorm.  
''I don't know what to think about that. I try not to.''  
''You can't put this on your list of things not to think about, Simon. This isn't summer between years at Watford, this is real--''  
''--I know, Baz.''  
Simon moves away from me, like he wants to get off the bed, then stops, his legs dangling off the side. He sounds angry.  
I decide not to say anything and stare at my lap.  
I can tell Simon is working up to a bluster, but all of the sudden he heaves a sigh, stares at the wall he's facing, then sighs again.  
''He was all I had. And I killed him. I found out all these horrible things about him. And now, it turns out, he was literally all I had. I destroyed the one thing I have left on this earth. I don't even know what to think of him.''  
He drops his head into his hands and I can see a few tears falling through his fingers onto the ground. I nod, even though he can't see me, and crawl a bit closer to him to stroke his back.  
''You're allowed to think whatever you like. I know we had our fights about the Mage in the past but... He meant a lot to you. I'm not here to disregard your feelings, I'm here because I love you. Don't let my opinion of him stand in the way of you confiding in me.''  
''It doesn't.''  
We're quiet again and after a while he says:  
''I'm not sure how I am now.'' ''I'm sorry, I shouldn't force you''  
''No you shouldn't. But it's alright, I know why you're doing it.''  
He turns around, fully ignoring me, and tries to lift the covers. I scooch away from him so he can get under them.  
''I'm just tired.'' He says, his voice slightly muted by the pillow underneath his head.  
I nod again and scoot backwards and get under the covers as well. He's facing away from me, so I let myself stare at him. Should I hold him? I feel like I'm back at Watford and I have to stare at him, because I can't actually talk to him. It hasn't been like this since... well since before we kissed. The moment we kissed was the moment he finally let me into his head. And I finally let him into mine.  
''I feel safe.'' I whisper softly. I don't know why I say it. It's not true. Right now is the least safe I've felt in a while. Not because the Humdrum or the Mage are out there trying to kill us, but because right now everything that used to be certain, isn't anymore. Maybe I say it because I want him to repeat it back to me. Because if he does feel safe, I can believe it too. But he doesn't. He doesn't do or say anything. I don't get any sleep that night.  



	14. Perhaps It's The Rainbow

BAZ

I must have fallen asleep after all because when I wake up, Simon is gone.  
I fell asleep in the early hours of the morning, so I slept in and when the streaks of sunlight fell on my face the burning woke me up. First I lifted the covers over my head, but when I noticed how easy that was — usually when I move the covers Simon puts up a fight (Because he’s always. Cold.)— I stretched out my arm, expecting to find Simon, but the bed was empty besides me and when I opened my eyes and crawled to the other side of the bed to check if his clothes were on the floor, they weren’t there.  
‘’Simon?’’ I called out to an empty apartment. No response.  
I get out of bed and close the curtains on the way to the living room.  
In the summer, the sun is much brighter which means it hurts more when it burns me. At Watford, I was lucky we got to go home during summer so I could spend most of it inside the house with all the curtains drawn. Most of the year Britain is a cloudy, depressing place to live in, but in summer the sun can be quite stingy.  
I check the kitchen, bathroom and living room. Simon left, without so much as leaving a note.  
I try calling him but his phone is switched off.  
Then I try calling Penny and at first she doesn’t pick up, but when I call Micah and ask him if they’d seen Simon, I hear some clutter and then Bunce asks me:  
‘’You don’t know where Simon is?’’  
‘’No. Do you?’’  
‘’No. Otherwise I wouldn’t have asked you.’’  
‘’Yes, I get that.’’  
‘’Did something happen last night?’’  
‘’Well besides, you know, everything. No, not really. We got home, we didn’t really talk. I tried getting some stuff out of him, but he wasn’t up for it. It seemed like he wasn’t even really there.’’  
‘’I think I know where he might be.’’ 

It’s a short walk to the Tate Gallery, and I try to stay in the shade as much as I can. My knees still hurt, badly, but parking in downtown London is dreadful, and I don’t like to use the underground anymore. It’s too dark. And suffocating.  
When I get there, Penelope is sitting in the shade on the large steps of the gallery. I walk up to her, and neither of us say a word as she leads me inside, deeper into the museum, to one of the large halls where we see Simon, standing in front of a painting, facing away from us.  
Penelope stops and looks at me, like she wants me to go talk to him. She seems to think I’m better at this, even though I never actually know what I’m doing.  
Nevertheless I appreciate her acknowledging my superiority.  
I walk over to him, as quietly as I can as I’m still limping a bit. When I’m next to him he turns his head a little, and without really looking he knows it’s me.  
He’s standing in front of a painting of a cathedral.  
He’s staring at it, in silence, and I decide to stay quiet too. I want him to know that I’m there, that’s all. I’m not here to force him to talk. I’m just here for him. I always will be.  
‘’Do you know what this painting’s called?’’ He finally says very quietly so only a vampire could hear.  
There are people passing the hall every now and then, and when the sound of groups of tourists and their tour guides dies down a bit I say: ‘’Of course.’’  
He swallows, a long, showy, swallow then says: ‘’Every summer I used to come here. Sometimes several times a month, just to see this painting. I never knew why, something about it drew me to it.’’  
‘’Perhaps it’s the rainbow.’’ I add cooly.  
‘’Do you know what it’s about?’’  
I don’t answer because I know he doesn’t expect me to. He wants to tell me.  
‘’This woman died, and the painting is filled with anguish and dark clouds, you see, but then there’s that rainbow. And I’ve always felt like it didn’t belong. Then one day I decide to ask one of the tour guides here, it was this lovely woman who always recognised me when I came in, and she always smiled at me like I was welcome here.  
I asked her: ‘’Why did the artist add the rainbow?’’  
And she told me: ‘’The rainbow represents hope.’’  
I remember thinking that I didn’t like that. I told her that I would’ve liked the painting better if he hadn’t added the rainbow - remember I was eleven or something at the time - and she just smiled and said: ‘’Perhaps someday you’ll change your mind.’’ So I went back a week later, and the week after that, but I didn’t.’’  
‘’Have you changed your mind now?’’  
He doesn’t answer me. He’s squinting at the painting, his face red.  
‘’Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows.’’ He says, and he sounds dumbfounded. ‘’Do you suppose that’s a coincidence? All these years I’ve come back to this painting. All these years I came back, and I found comfort in this stupid, ugly painting, and I never understood why. But immediately, when Penelope said my mother’s last name was Salisbury, all I could think about was this. This stupid painting, that I thought was meaningless.’’  
I don’t say anything, I let him throw it all out, mainly because I don’t know what to say.  
‘’The tour guide told me that the woman who died, the woman from the painting, was named Amelia and she died in her lover, Celadon’s arms.’’ His voice breaks and he chokes back his tears, his face even more red than before. ‘’What does that tour guide know, right? For all we know Celadon killed Amelia. For all we know he killed the love of his life in cold blood and threw his child out on the street without second thought.’’  
A single tear rolls downs his face, sticking to his jaw, but he doesn’t wipe it away. Then he turns, suddenly, without acknowledging me or Penelope, and walks out faster than we can react. When we can’t hear his footsteps anymore, Penelope walks over to me and wraps her arms around me. Neither of us say anything, but I hesitantly put my arms around her and pull her a bit closer. When she speaks, her voice is muted by my jumper.  
‘’I think it might be worse than we thought.’’


End file.
